IBM Brings Swift to Cloud; Simplifies End-to-End Development of Apps

LAS VEGAS, NV: IBM announces the preview of Swift Runtime and Swift Package Catalog on the cloud, helping enable developers to create applications for the enterprise.

IBM allows developers to use native Swift for the development of applications. The company is using the programming language made by Apple-Swift, to unlock its potential by simplifying the development of end-to-end apps on the IBM Cloud.

The announcement is the next step between the journey of IBM and Apple in their quest to help enterprises advance their strategy by innovating app design, analytics, process transformation and integration required for a mobile first experience.

IBM intends to use Swift as a server-side language for enterprise development. Traditionally, different technologies are used to develop the application on the client and the business logic on the server. By bringing Swift beyond the client to the server,IBM is breaking down barriers between front-end and back-end development, which can provide enterprises a single language to build rich experiences and back-end business logic.

Enterprises can realize increased speed and efficiency while taking advantage of the growing availability of Swift skills. With the usage of Swift on the server it also enables a simple, secure tool chain for end-to-end application development.

IBM Swift engineers are also working with the growing Swift.org developer community and are most notably focused on contributing to concurrency on multi-core hardware, which is critical for enterprise-scale workloads.

Developers can start exploring the benefits of Swift on the IBM Cloud by conducting experiments with the open sourced Swift and increasing their skill set to learn about the offerings of Swift Sandbox.They can also start building end-to-end applications on Bluemix and deploy them with Kitura, a new open source web server released by IBM, on both OSX and Linux.

Developers can Leverage code across projects by creating packages and submitting them to the Swift Package Catalog on Bluemix to encourage sharing of new Swift resources with the global developer community.

"Modern digital apps require a modern programming language. Swift is easy-to-learn, reliable, fast and interactive, the key traits that CIOs look for when building the next generation of enterprise mobile apps," says Michael Gilfix, Vice President, IBM MobileFirst Offering Management. "Swift on the Cloud is an opportunity for enterprises to radically simplify the development of end-to-end applications and therefore reach new levels of productivity."