Swift arrays are not necessarily contiguous blocks of memory (although they may be in some cases so some code may work in some cases but not in others). Some operations may trigger them to be converted to a contiguous block of memory and I believe that is what can particularly cause issues when there is access from multiple threads.

[Update - This post is more popular than I expected (thanks Reddit). I've added some additional notes at the bottom. Also the previous post about optimisation is probably more interesting and valuable.]

Even the code as described here may not work (and I haven't tested at all) when there are multiple reads or writes that access the same elements of the array. All the code I used was either reading from a constant array (safe from multiple threads/queues) or writing into non-overlapping ranges with no reads occurring (only seems safe with the technique described here).

.withUnsafeMutableBufferPointer

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I should probably have written this sooner as it has been 10 days since Beta 3 was released, but I've only just noticed that there is a bit of traffic still coming in about Swift Arrays from my earlier posts about the array semantics in the first Swift betas. The short version is that I'm very happy with the new Swift Arrays in Beta 3 which have full value semantics (optimised with copy on write under the hood). The syntax for declaring arrays has also changed which is fine although I didn't have a particular problem with the old syntax. Be sure to update the Swift iBooks (delete and download again) as there are some significant changes.

The copy() and unshare() functions are gone because unshare has essentially become the default behaviour (although contents changes not just length changes now trigger the copy so copy is not needed either).

Semantic Changes

1. Arrays are no longer reference types. You can treat every assignment, argument pass and function return as if it were a copy.
2. Changing the contents of an array is no longer permitted when the array is declared constant with let.

In this example you can see the copy-on-write (CoW) behaviour using the identity operator (=== which I wouldn't recommend you doing in real code to affect behaviour on the CoW status but it enables us to observe the CoW). In the example it doesn't make any difference if a is declared with let or var but b must be declared as var otherwise you will get a compile time error because the contents change.

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Just seen the announcement on the developer forum from Chris Lattner (link for registered developers and another).

If you want to know about the array issues in Beta 1 see the threads above or my last two posts.

I don't know and I don't really care if it was always the plan or is a result of feedback. I think this is very good news.

I think that this means that it will be copy on write behaviour so that if you aren't changing the array you get pass by reference performance and only pay the call by value price when a mutation will occur. It may even be smart enough to know when the caller isn't going to access the array again and allow it to pass and mutate the original. We'll see in beta 3 (or maybe later).

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UPDATE 2: I've added a new post about the changes in Beta 3 (I like them)

UPDATE: Apple have indicated that the array behaviour in Swift is going to change - see this post

My previous post suggests an explanation for why the behaviour of Swift Arrays is as it currently (in the very first Swift release) is as it is. In this post I intend to explain the behaviours, show the problems and give examples. Many examples are based on those found in this thread on the Apple Developer forums. Feel free to add comments if I've missed any categories and I'll incorporate them if they form a different case.

The relevant part of the documentation covers most of the behaviour and apart from the issues specifically mentioned in the Bugs section at the bottom these are descriptions of the specification not just the implementation.

Is it Value? Is it Reference? No its Confused!

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