iii. About the Cover

The pearl oyster is found in numerous locations around the world, throughout the tropical and sub-tropical regions of the ocean. Although most of us hold a romantic notion of ocean divers finding lone oysters with a beautiful, rare pearl inside, the majority of jewelry-quality pearls come from commercially farmed pearl oysters.

Natural pearls form when an irritant, such as a tiny parasite, invades the shell of the oyster. In commercial applications, the “irritant” is actually an implanted bead or piece of mother-of-pearl. In either case, the oyster coats the irritant with layer after layer of a coating called “nacre”, sometimes for years, until a lustrous pearl is formed.

SwiftUI is the pearl in your own development oyster; although initially it feels out of place, as you create layers upon layers of views in your SwiftUI app, you’ll come to learn that declarative UI development can really bring some luster to your apps. And just like the strings of pearls in a necklace, the collection of SwiftUI views in your app will come together to form something beautiful and quite valuable — no skin-diving necessary!