iOS SDK

This guide provides detailed information about our iOS SDK. All of our SDKs are open source. Go to our iOS SDK GitHub repository to see the source code.

Language Support

This library is compatible with iOS deployment target versions 9.0 and later, and Swift version 4 and later.

Initialization

To get started, set up Split in your code base with two simple steps.

1. Import the SDK into your project

CocoaPods

You can import the SDK into your Xcode project using CocoaPods, adding it in your Podfile.

pod 'Split', '~> 2.5.0'

Carthage

You can also import the SDK using Carthage, adding it in your Cartfile.

github "splitio/ios-client" 2.5.0

Then follow the steps provided in the Carthage Readme.

2. Instantiate the SDK and create a new Split client

The first time that the SDK is instantiated, it kicks off background tasks to update an in-memory cache and in-storage cache with small amounts of data fetched from Split servers. This process can take up to a few hundred milliseconds depending on the size of the data.

If the SDK is asked to evaluate which treatment to show to a customer for a specific split while it is in this intermediate state, it may not have the data necessary to run the evaluation. In this case, the SDK does not fail, rather, it returns the control treatment.

After the first initialization, the fetched data is stored. Further initializations fetch data from that cache and the configuration is available immediately.

We recommend instantiating the SDK once as a singleton and reusing it throughout your application.

Include the API key for the environment that you are setting up the SDK for. The API key is available on your Organization Settings page, on the APIs tab. Choose the "browser" type. This is a special type of API token with limited privileges to be used for the untrustable world of browsers or mobile clients. Learn more about API keys.

import Split

// Your Split API-KEY
let apiKey: String = "YOUR_API_KEY"

//User Key
let key: Key = Key(matchingKey: "key")

//Split Configuration
let config = SplitClientConfig()

//Split Factory
let builder = DefaultSplitFactoryBuilder()
let factory = builder.setApiKey(apiKey).setKey(key).setConfig(config).build()

//Split Client
let client = factory?.client

Using the SDK

Basic use

To make sure the SDK is properly loaded before asking it for a treatment you should wait until the SDK is ready as shown below. We set the client to listen for the sdkReady event triggered by the SDK before asking for an evaluation.

Once the sdkReady event fires, you can use the getTreatment method to return the proper treatment based on the SPLIT_NAME you pass and the key you passed when instantiating the SDK.

From there, you simply need to use an if-else-if block as shown below and plug the code in for the different treatments that you defined in the Split UI. Make sure to remember the final else branch in your code to handle the client returning control.

client?.on(event: SplitEvent.sdkReady) {
  // Evaluate key in Split
  let treatment = client?.getTreatment("SPLIT_NAME")

  if treatment == "on" {
      // insert code here to show on treatment
  } else if treatment == "off" {
      // insert code here to show off treatment
  } else {
      // insert your control treatment code here
  }
}
client?.on(event: SplitEvent.sdkReadyTimedOut) {
  //handle for timeouts here
  print("SDK time out")
}

Shutdown

Before letting your app shut down, call destroy() as it gracefully shuts down the Split SDK by stopping all background threads, clearing caches, closing connections, and flushing the remaining unpublished impressions and events.

client?.destroy()

Also, this method has a completion closure which can be used to run some code after destroy was executed.
For instance, the following snippet waits until destroy has finished to continue execution:

let semaphore = DispatchSemaphore(value: 0)
client?.destroy(completion: {
    _ = semaphore.signal()
})
semaphore.wait()

After destroy() has been called, any subsequent invocations to the client.getTreatment() or manager methods result in control or empty list respectively.

Multiple evaluations at once

In some instances, you may want to evaluate treatments for multiple splits at once. Use the GetTreatments method of the Split client to do this. Simply pass a list of the split names you want treatments for and the method returns an object with the results.

let splitList = ["SPLIT_NAME_1", "SPLIT_NAME_2", "SPLIT_NAME_3"]
let treatments = client?.getTreatments(splits: splitList, attributes: nil)

// treatments will have the following form:
// {
//   "SPLIT_NAME_1": "result_1",
//   "SPLIT_NAME_2": "result_2",
//   "SPLIT_NAME_3": "result_3"
// }

Attribute syntax

To target based on custom attributes, the SDK's getTreatment method needs to be passed an attribute map at runtime.

In the example below, we are rolling out a split to users. The provided attributes plan_type, registered_date, permissions, paying_customer, and deal_size are passed to the getTreatment call. These attributes are compared and evaluated against the attributes used in the Rollout plan as defined in the Split Web console to decide whether to show the on or off treatment to this account.

The getTreatment method supports five types of attributes: strings, numbers, dates, booleans, and sets. The proper data type and syntax for each are:

• Strings: Use type String.
• Numbers: Use type Int64.
• Dates: Use the value TimeInterval. For instance, the value for the registered_date attribute below is Date().timeIntervalSince1970, which is a TimeInterval value.
• Booleans: Use type Bool.
• Sets: Use type [String].

var attributes: [String:Any] = [:]

attributes["plan_type"] = "growth"
attributes["registered_date"] = Date().timeIntervalSince1970
attributes["deal_size"] = 1000
attributes["paying_customer"] = true
let perms: [String] = ["read", "write"];
attributes["permissions"] = perms

// See client initialization above
let treatment = client?.getTreatment("SPLIT_NAME", attributes: attributes)

if treatment == "on" {
    // insert code here to show on treatment
} else if treatment == "off" {
    // insert code here to show off treatment
} else {
    // insert your control treatment code here
}

Get Treatments with Configurations

To leverage dynamic configurations with your treatments, you should use the getTreatmentWithConfig method.

This method will return an object containing the treatment and associated configuration.

The config element will be a stringified version of the configuration JSON defined in the Split web console. If there is no configuration defined for a treatment, the SDK will return null for the config parameter.

This method takes the exact same set of arguments as the standard getTreatment method. See below for examples on proper usage:

let result = client.getTreatmentWithConfig("new_boxes", attributes: attributes)
let config = try? JSONSerialization.jsonObject(with: result.config.data(using: .utf8)!, options: []) as? [String: Any]
let treatment = result.treatment

If you need to get multiple evaluations at once, you can also use the get_treatments_with_config. The method takes the exact same arguments as the get_treatments method but just returns a mapping of split names to splitResults instead of strings. Example usage below.

let splitList = ["SPLIT_NAME_1", "SPLIT_NAME_2", "SPLIT_NAME_3"]
let treatments = client?.getTreatmentsWithConfig(splits: splitList, attributes: nil)

// treatments will have the following form:
// {
//   "SPLIT_NAME_1": { "treatment": "on", "config": "{ \"color\":\"red\" }"},
//   "SPLIT_NAME_2": { "treatment": "visa", "config": "{ \"color\":\"red\" }"}
// }

Track

Use the track method to record any actions your customers perform. Each action is known as an event and corresponds to an event type. Calling track through one of our SDKs or via the API is the first step to getting experimentation data into Split and allows you to measure the impact of your splits on your users' actions and metrics.

Learn more about using track events in splits.

In the examples below you can see that the .track() method can take up to four arguments. The proper data type and syntax for each are:

• TRAFFIC_TYPE: The traffic type of the key in the track call. The expected data type is String. You can only pass values that match the names of traffic types that you have defined in your instance of Split.
• EVENT_TYPE: The event type that this event should correspond to. The expected data type is String. Full requirements on this argument are:
  • Contains 63 characters or fewer.
  • Starts with a letter or number.
  • Contains only letters, numbers, hyphen, underscore, or period.
  • This is the regular expression we use to validate the value: [a-zA-Z0-9][-_\.a-zA-Z0-9]{0,62}
• VALUE: (Optional) The value to be used in creating the metric. This field can be sent in as null or 0 if you intend to purely use the count function when creating a metric. The expected data type is Double.
• PROPERTIES: (Optional) An object of key value pairs that can be used to filter your metrics. Learn more about event property capture here. Split currently supports three types of properties: strings, numbers, and booleans.

The track method returns a boolean value of true or false to indicate whether or not the SDK was able to successfully queue the event to be sent back to Split's servers on the next event post. The SDK will return false if the current queue size is equal to the config set by eventsQueueSize or if an incorrect input to the track method has been provided.

In the case that a bad input has been provided, you can read more about our SDK's expected behavior here

// If you would like to send an event without a value
let resp = client?.track(trafficType: "TRAFFIC_TYPE", eventType: "EVENT-TYPE")
// Example
let resp = client?.track(trafficType: "user", eventType: "page_load_time")

// If you would like to associate a value to an event
let resp = client?.track(trafficType: "TRAFFIC_TYPE", eventType: "EVENT-TYPE", value: VALUE)
// Example  
let resp = client?.track(trafficType: "user", eventType: "page_load_time", value: 83.334)

// If you would like to associate just properties to an event
let resp = client?.track(trafficType: "TRAFFIC_TYPE", eventType: "EVENT-TYPE", properties: PROPERTIES)
// Example  
let properties: [String:Any] = ["package": "premium", "discount": 50, "admin": true]
let resp = client?.track(trafficType: "user", eventType: "page_load_time", properties: properties)

// If you would like to send an event but you've already defined the traffic type in the config of the client
let resp = client?.track(eventType: "EVENT-TYPE")
// Example
let resp = client?.track(eventType: "page_load_time")

// If you would like to associate a value to an event and you've already defined the traffic type in the config of the client
let resp = client.track(eventType: "EVENT-TYPE", value: VALUE)
// Example  
let resp = client?.track(eventType: "page_load_time", value: 83.334)

// If you would like to associate properties to an event and you've already defined the traffic type in the config of the client
let resp = client.track(eventType: "EVENT-TYPE", properties: PROPERTIES)
// Example  
let properties: [String:Any] = ["package": "premium", "discount": 50, "admin": true]
let resp = client?.track(eventType: "page_load_time", proerties: properties)

Manager

Use the Split Manager to get a list of features available to the Split client.

To instantiate a Manager in your code base, use the same factory that you used for your client.

let apiKey: String = "YOUR_API_KEY"
let key: Key = Key(matchingKey: "key")
let config = SplitClientConfig()
let builder = DefaultSplitFactoryBuilder()
let factory =
builder.setApiKey(apiKey).setKey(key).setConfig(config).build()
let manager = factory?.manager

The Manager then has the following properties and methods available.

/**
 * Retrieves the Splits that are currently registered with the
 * SDK.
 *
 * @return an array of SplitView or empty.
 */
var splits: [SplitView] { get }

/**
 * Returns the names of features (or Splits) registered with the SDK.
 *
 * @return an array of String (Split Feature Names) or empty
 */
var splitNames: [String] { get }

/**
 * Returns the Splits registered with the SDK of this name.
 *
 * @return SplitView or nil
 */
func split(featureName: String) -> SplitView?

The SplitView class referenced above has the following structure.

@objc public class SplitView: NSObject, Codable {

    public var name: String?
    public var trafficType: String?
    public var killed: Bool?
    public var treatments: [String]?
    public var changeNumber: Int64?

}

Configuration

The SDK has a number of knobs for configuring performance. Each knob is tuned to a reasonable default. However, you can override the value while instantiating the SDK. The parameters available for configuration are shown below.

To set each of the parameters defined above, use the syntax below.

import Split

// Your Split API-KEY
let apiKey: String = "YOUR_API_KEY"

//User Key
let key: Key = Key(matchingKey: "key")

//Split Configuration
let config = SplitClientConfig()
config.featuresRefreshRate = 60
config.segmentsRefreshRate = 30
config.impressionRefreshRate = 30

//Split Factory
let builder = DefaultSplitFactoryBuilder()
let factory =
builder.setApiKey(apiKey).setKey(key).setConfig(config).build()

//Split Client
let client = factory?.client

Localhost Mode

Features start their life on one developer's machine. A developer should be able to put code behind Splits on their development machine without the SDK requiring network connectivity. To achieve this, the Split SDK can be started in 'localhost' mode. In this mode, the SDK neither polls nor updates Split servers, rather it uses an in-memory data structure to determine what treatments to show to the customer for each of the features.

Here is how you can start the SDK in 'localhost' mode:

Since version 2.1.0, our SDK supports a new type of localhost split definition file, using the YAML format.
This new format allows the user to map different keys to different treatments within a single split, and also add configurations to them.
This file has to be included into the project bundle and it will be used as an initial file. It will be copied to the cache folder, then it can be edited while app is running to simulate split changes. When no file is added to the app bundle, an error will occur.

The new format is a list of single-key maps (one per mapping split-keys-config), defined as follows:

# - feature_name:
#     treatment: "treatment_applied_to_this_entry"
#     keys: "single_key_or_list"
#     config: "{\"desc\" : \"this applies only to ON treatment\"}"

- my_feature:
    treatment: "on"
    keys: "key"
    config: "{\"desc\" : \"this applies only to ON treatment\"}"
- some_other_feature:
    treatment: "off"
- my_feature:
    treatment: "off"
- other_feature:
    treatment: "off"
    keys: ["key_1", "key_2"]
    config: "{\"desc\" : \"this overrides multiple keys and returns off treatment for those keys\"}"

In the example above, we have 3 entries:

• The first one defines that for split my_feature, the key key will return the treatment on and the on treatment will be tied to the configuration {"desc" : "this applies only to ON treatment"}.
• The second entry defines that the feature some_other_feature will always return the off treatment and no configuration.
• The third entry defines that my_feature will always return off for all keys that don't match another entry (in this case, any key other than key).
• The forth entry shows how an example to override a treatment for a set of keys.

You can set the name of the Split localhost YAML file within cache folder as shown in the example below:

// Split API-KEY must be "localhost"
let apiKey: String = "localhost"
let key: Key = Key(matchingKey: "key")
let config = SplitClientConfig()
config.splitFile = "localhost.yaml"
let builder = DefaultSplitFactoryBuilder()
self.factory =
builder.setApiKey("localhost").setKey(key).setConfig(config).build()

If SplitClientConfig.splitFile is not set, Split SDK maintains backward compatibility by trying to load the legacy file (.splits), now deprecated.
In this mode, the SDK loads a local file called localhost.splits which has the following line format:

SPLIT TREATMENT

Additionally, you can include comments to the file starting a line with the # character

Example: A sample localhost.splits file

 # This line is a comment
 # Following line has feature = FEATURE_ONE and treatment = ON
 FEATURE_ONE ON
 FEATURE_TWO OFF
 # Previous line has feature = FEATURE_TWO, treatment = OFF

By enabling debug mode, the localhost file location will be logged to the console so that is possible to open it with a text editor when working on the simulator. When using the device to run the app, the file can be modified by overwriting the app's bundle from the Device and Simulators tool.

Impression listener

Split SDKs send impression data back to Split servers periodically and as a result of evaluating splits. To additionally send this information to a location of your choice, define and attach an impression handler.

The SDK sends the generated impressions to the impression handler right away. As a result, be careful while implementing handling logic to avoid blocking the main thread. Generally speaking, you should create a separate thread to handle incoming impressions (see the snippet below).

let config = SplitClientConfig()
config.setImpressionListener() { (impression) in
        // Do some work on main thread
        DispatchQueue.global().async {
            // Do some async work (use this most of the time!)
        }
}        

let key: Key = Key(matchingKey: "key")
let builder = DefaultSplitFactoryBuilder()
let factory =
builder.setApiKey(apiKey).setKey(key).setConfig(config).build()
let client = factory?.client

Flush

The flush() method sends the data stored in memory (impressions and events) to Split cloud and clears the successfully posted data. If a connection issue is experienced, the data will be sent on the next attempt.

client.flush()

Advanced: Subscribe to events

You can listen for two different types of events from the SDK.

• sdkReady is fired when the SDK has the necessary evaluation information. If the last known configuration is in the disk cache, this event is triggered immediately. If this is the first time the SDK is instantiated, this event is triggered when the SDK has all the information requested from our servers.
• sdkReadyTimedOut is fired if there is no last known configuration in disk cache, and the SDK could not acquire the information from our servers after a given period of time, determined by the ready parameter in SplitClientConfig.

SDK event handling is done through the function on(event:execute:), which receives a closure as an event handler.

The code within the closure is executed on the main thread. For that reason, running code in the background must be done explicitly.

The syntax to listen for an event is shown below.

...
let client = factory.client
client.on(event: SplitEvent.sdkReady, execute: {
  // Do some staff on main thread

  DispatchQueue.global().async {
    // Do some async stuff
  }
})

// Or

client.on(event: SplitEvent.sdkReady) {
  // Do some staff on main thread

  DispatchQueue.global().async {
    // Do some async stuff
  }
}
...