How do I use metatypes and reflection (Mirror) in Swift?

In Swift, metatypes and reflection can be utilized to inspect types and their properties during runtime. This is particularly useful for dynamic features such as serialization, logging, or debugging.

Metatypes represent the type of a type, allowing you to reference a class or struct programmatically. Using the Mirror API, you can introspect instances and get detailed information about their properties and values.

Example of Using Metatypes and Reflection in Swift

// Define a sample class class Person { var name: String var age: Int init(name: String, age: Int) { self.name = name self.age = age } } // Create an instance of Person let person = Person(name: "John Doe", age: 30) // Reflect on the Person instance let mirror = Mirror(reflecting: person) // Print the details of the properties for child in mirror.children { if let propertyName = child.label { print("\(propertyName): \(child.value)") } } // Getting the metatype of the Person class let personType: Person.Type = Person.self print("Metatype: \(personType)")

metatypes reflection Mirror Swift introspection dynamic features

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