[ios] Conditional Binding: if let error – Initializer for conditional binding must have Optional type

I am trying to delete a row from my Data Source and the following line of code:

if let tv = tableView {

causes the following error:

Initializer for conditional binding must have Optional type, not UITableView

Here is the full code:

// Override to support editing the table view.
func tableView(tableView: UITableView, commitEditingStyle editingStyle:UITableViewCellEditingStyle, forRowAtIndexPath indexPath: NSIndexPath) {
    if editingStyle == .Delete {

        // Delete the row from the data source

    if let tv = tableView {

            myData.removeAtIndex(indexPath.row)

            tv.deleteRowsAtIndexPaths([indexPath], withRowAnimation: .Fade)

How should I correct the following?

 if let tv = tableView {

This question is related to ios swift optional-binding

The answer is


What it is telling you is - the 2nd guard let or the if let check is not happening on an Optional Int or Optional String. You already have a non-optional value, so guarding or if-letting is not needed anymore


Well, it'd still be convenient (syntactically) if we could declare usual values inside the if's condition. So, here's a trick: you can make the compiler think there is an assignment of Optional.some(T) to a value like so:

    if let i = "abc".firstIndex(of: "a"),
        let i_int = .some(i.utf16Offset(in: "abc")),
        i_int < 1 {
        // Code
    }

condition binding must have optinal type which mean that you can only bind optional values in if let statement

func tableView(_ tableView: UITableView, commit editingStyle: UITableViewCellEditingStyle, forRowAt indexPath: IndexPath) {

    if editingStyle == .delete {

        // Delete the row from the data source

        if let tv = tableView as UITableView? {


        }
    }
}

This will work fine but make sure when you use if let it must have optinal type "?"


In a case where you are using a custom cell type, say ArticleCell, you might get an error that says :

    Initializer for conditional binding must have Optional type, not 'ArticleCell'

You will get this error if your line of code looks something like this:

    if let cell = tableView.dequeReusableCell(withIdentifier: "ArticleCell",for indexPath: indexPath) as! ArticleCell 

You can fix this error by doing the following :

    if let cell = tableView.dequeReusableCell(withIdentifier: "ArticleCell",for indexPath: indexPath) as ArticleCell?

If you check the above, you will see that the latter is using optional casting for a cell of type ArticleCell.


for my specific problem I had to replace

if let count = 1
    {
        // do something ...
    }

With

let count = 1
if(count > 0)
    {
        // do something ...
    }

Same applies for guard statements. The same error message lead me to this post and answer (thanks @nhgrif).

The code: Print the last name of the person only if the middle name is less than four characters.

func greetByMiddleName(name: (first: String, middle: String?, last: String?)) {
    guard let Name = name.last where name.middle?.characters.count < 4 else {
        print("Hi there)")
        return
    }
    print("Hey \(Name)!")
}

Until I declared last as an optional parameter I was seeing the same error.