[WIP] Change resource to protocol

[mathebox]

Hi @wvteijlingen,

this is my attempt to change Resource to a protocol. Please have a look. The code is still kind of messy and really not ready to be merged. But the tests are passing :tada:

I made the following changes

• Add lots of generics
• Change Resource to protocol
• Removed NSCoding conformance of Resource. Each implementation should handle this on its own.
• Use ZeWo/Reflection (see #152) for getting and setting properties. They do not provide a dynamic framework which is necessary for carthage. So I used carthage update --no-build and created a workspace for Spine and a project for Reflection.
• Move lots of logic into Field instances due to generic types. This also prevents switch statements of fields of resources.
• Change Field implementation to protocol-struct-combination. (We need to these protocols to hide the generic types, e.g. the Relationship protocol)
• Since swift protocols do not support stored properties, every implementation of Resource needs a resourceData property.

Next steps / further improvements

• [ ] Cleanup code inkl. tests (There is lots of "old" code.)
• [ ] Documentation
• [ ] Fix build for macOS, tvOS and watchOS
• [ ] Improve access control
• [ ] Add a FieldData struct (similar to ResourceData) to avoid code repetition
• [ ] Fix travis-ci
• [ ] Add description and debugDescription to Resource

Additional notes We should distinguish between Attribute and Relationship of Resource objects. Currently they are returned as Field instances. Therefore the Field protocol contains some methods which are only used when working with relationships.

What's do we need to support CoreData? (This should probably be moved to a separate issue.)

• ToMany-relationships in CoreData will not work with ResourceCollection objects. Maybe we could provide the links etc. via methods onResource.
• CoreData can't store URL. We have to check the type of the property (String vs URL). This should be handled by the URLAttribute.

Hopefully I have covered every change I made. What are your thoughts?

[markst]

151

[markst]

Hey @mathebox, thanks for making a start at this. I was trying to pickup where you left off. For starters I wasn't able to implement the protocol without having to conform entirely to Resource protocol. This seems to be due extension Resource not being public where as the Resource protocol is.

[markst]

Also seems to break the ability to sequence a bunch of BrightFuture futures: [self.spine.delete(self.fitting),self.spine.save(self.fitting)].sequence().onSuccess(callback: { (resources) in

[mmoonport]

Hello guys. I have worked on a a couple ORM's and wonder if there is anything I could lend a hand with. We are looking at using this library but the "offline mode" abilities really should be moved to CoreData and thus, here we are.

[mmoonport]

After doing some research into this issue for our own uses. We have come up with an idea of using spine in concert with core data, abstracted behind NSIncrementalStore. This will allow us to use core data natively with the ability to have our "back-end" be a spine-compliant API. AFNetworking once had a AFIncrementalStore that used AFRESTClient. I believe this could be easily ported to be used with spine. The only thing that would make sense to me is allow the incremental store the ability to create a "Resource" Class by inspecting a NSManagedObject for which fields it has and what types they are when it begins the store in loadMetadata. This would prevent the need for both and give a user wanting to persist with core-data a backend connected to their api. I am hoping that @wvteijlingen could guide me in the right direction as to the dynamic creation of a resource.

[markst]

@mmoonport hey. I've forked this PR branch into our own & have written persistence using Realm. It isn't amazing; but it works for our needs. I'm keen to write a more robust persistence layer on-top of Spine; but it seems development & activity has gone stale.