Get Unix Timestamp that increases by itself

Question

So basically what I'd like to do is have a date object

let unixTime = Date().timeIntervalSince1970.advanced(by: -30)

and have unixTime change as the seconds pass so that unixTime is offset from the current time without me having to increase the value myself. Is there a way to do that in Swift?

@JoakimDanielson for example, if the unix time right now was 15000 5 seconds later if I called the variable it would be 15005. — Navjeeven Mann, Jul 10 '20 at 14:29

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Jul 10 '20 at 15:18

Instead of declaring unixTime as a constant, declare it as a computed variable.

For example, if this code is part of a struct or class, I'd do this:

struct Test {
    var unixTime: Date {
        Date().timeIntervalSince1970.advanced(by: -30)
    }

    func tion() {
        //do stuff
    }

    ...
}

If you need it in an imperative context (such as a script) or you don't want to clutter the namespace of your type, you can declare it locally:

...
doStuff()
var unixTime: Date {
    Date().timeIntervalSince1970.advanced(by: -30)
}
...

Either way, you can refer to it in the same way as you are doing now, but it will be recomputed every time.

Get Unix Timestamp that increases by itself

1 Answers1