emitter kit

Type-safe event handling for Swift

566
70
Swift

emitter-kit v5.2.2

stable
CocoaPods Compatible
Carthage Compatible
Platform

A replacement for NSNotificationCenter#addObserver and NSObject#addObserver that is type-safe and not verbose.

import EmitterKit

// A generic event emitter (but type-safe)!
var event = Event<T>()

// Any emitted data must be the correct type.
event.emit(data)

// This listener will only be called once.
// You are *not* required to retain it.
event.once { data: T in
  print(data)
}

// This listener won't stop listening;
// unless you stop it manually,
// or its Event<T> is deallocated.
// You *are* required to retain it.
var listener = event.on { data: T in
  print(data)
}

// Stop the listener manually.
listener.isListening = false

// Restart the listener (if it was stopped).
listener.isListening = true

 

Targeting

A target allows you to associate a specific AnyObject with an emit call. This is useful when emitting events associated with classes you can’t add properties to (like UIView).

When calling emit with a target, you must also call on or once with the same target in order to receive the emitted event.

let myView = UIView()
let didTouch = Event<UITouch>()

didTouch.once(myView) { touch in
  print(touch)
}

didTouch.emit(myView, touch)

 

NSNotification

The Notifier class helps when you are forced to use NSNotificationCenter (for example, if you want to know when the keyboard has appeared).

// You are **not** required to retain this after creating your listener.
var event = Notifier(UIKeyboardWillShowNotification)

// Handle NSNotifications with style!
listener = event.on { (notif: Notification) in
  print(notif.userInfo)
}

 

Key-Value Observation (KVO)

// Any NSObject descendant will work.
var view = UIView()

// "Make KVO great again!" - Donald Trump
listener = view.on("bounds") { (change: Change<CGRect>) in
  print(change)
}

 

Thread Safety

⚠️ None of the classes in EmitterKit are thread-safe!

The following actions must be done on the same thread, or you need manual locking:

  • Emit an event
  • Add/remove a listener
  • Set the isListening property of a listener

 

v5.2.2 changelog

  • Fixed protocol casting (#60)

v5.2.1 changelog

  • Fix Carthage compatibility for non iOS platforms

v5.2.0 changelog

  • Added the Event.getListeners method
  • Listeners are now always called in the order they were added
  • Event.emit() can be called without an argument
  • Carthage support has been improved

v5.1.0 changelog

  • The NotificationListener class now takes a Notification instead of an NSDictionary.

  • A NotificationListener without a target will now receive every Notification with its name, regardless of the value of notif.object.

v5.0.0 changelog

  • Swift 3.0 + Xcode 8.0 beta 6 support

  • The Signal class was removed. (use Event<Void> instead)

  • The Emitter abstract class was removed.

  • The EmitterListener class was renamed EventListener<T>.

  • The Event<T> class no longer has a superclass.

  • The Notification class was renamed Notifier (to prevent collision with Foundation.Notification).

  • The on and once methods of Event<T> now return an EventListener<T> (instead of just a Listener)

  • The on and once methods of Notifier now return an NotificationListener (instead of just a Listener)

  • The on and once methods of NSObject now return an ChangeListener<T> (instead of just a Listener)

  • The keyPath, options, and object properties of ChangeListener<T> are now public.

  • A listenerCount: Int computed property was added to the Event<T> class.

  • An event: Event<T> property was added to the EventListener<T> class.

The changelog for older versions can be found here.