Lazy property initialization in Swift

Question

How would you implement the following pattern in Swift?

The Container class is initialized with a JSON array that contains dictionaries. These dictionar

Answer 1

You could use an optional as the instance variable. Then create a function that returns the optional if it exists, and a new object if it does not to simulate lazy loading.

class Lazy {
    var lazyVariable:String?

    func lazilyGetEntries() -> String {
        if let possibleVariable = self.lazyVariable { // optional already exists
            return possibleVariable
        }
        else {                                        // optional does not exist, create it
            self.lazyVariable = String()
            return self.lazyVariable!
        }
    }
}