i. What You Need

To follow along with this book, you’ll need the following:

• Swift 5.2: Vapor 4 requires Swift 5.2 minimum in both Xcode and from the command line.

• Xcode 11.4 or later: Xcode is the main development tool for writing code in Swift. You need Xcode 11.4 at a minimum, since that version includes Swift 5.2. You can download the latest version of Xcode for free from the Mac App Store.

If you haven’t installed the latest version of Xcode, be sure to do that before continuing with the book. The code covered in this book depends on Swift 5.2 and Xcode 11.4 — you may get lost if you try to work with an older version.

This book provides the building blocks for developers who wish to use Vapor to create server-side Swift applications. It shows you how to take the familiar type-safe, compiler-driven world of Swift you know from iOS and use it on the server.

The only prerequisites for this book are an intermediate understanding of Swift and iOS development. If you’ve worked through our classic beginner books — Swift Apprentice https://www.raywenderlich.com/books/swift-apprentice and UIKit Apprentice https://www.raywenderlich.com/books/uikit-apprentice — or have similar development experience, you’re ready to read this book.

As you work through the book, you’ll develop a server-side app called TIL — Today I Learned — for recording and categorizing acronyms. You’ll first build a REST API to support iOS and other client apps. Then, you’ll build a web site with direct access to the data and protect it all with authentication.