Getting started with Vapor

Getting started with Vapor is easy thanks to the handy Vapor Toolbox and well written documentation.

Prerequisites

• Swift 4.1 (bundled with Xcode)
• Xcode 9.3 or higher (optional if you install Swift manually)

Installing Vapor

The preferred method of installation is via brew.

To install Vapor run to following commands in Terminal:

brew tap vapor/tap && brew install vapor/tap/vapor

Creating a new Vapor Project

With Vapor now installed, you can now create a new project:

vapor new api-gateway

This will use the default --api template but you can also use the --web template for example:

vapor new web-ui --web

Building your project

Next you will need to build your project:

vapor build

The initial build will take some time as it needs to download and compile all the dependencies. Subsequent builds will be much quicker.

Running your project

Now that your project is built, you can simply run it with the following command:

vapor run

With your server running you can expect to see the following output:

Running default command: .build/debug/Run serve
Server starting on http://localhost:8080

Working with Xcode

Since Vapor leans on Swift Package Manager you don’t need Xcode to get started with Vapor. You could use any Text Editor of your choice especially if you’re not running macOS. If you are however running macOS you would most probably want to use Xcode by creating an Xcode project:

vapor xcode

This will generate an Xcode project for you allowing you to run and debug your application just like you would do for any other Xcode project.

That’s it! You are now ready to write Server-Side applications using Swift.