JSONSerialization with URLSession.shared.dataTask errors - json

Question

As a part of teaching myself Swift, I am working on a Weather App. I am currently attempting to integrate weather alerts. I use a struct called AlertData to initialize data returned from the API call to weather.gov after serializing the returned data from an API call. Or, at least that is the plan. I have modeled my classes off of other classes that request data from weather.gov, but to get an alert, I need to be able to send variable parameters in my dataTask. I use the URL extension from Apple's App Development with Swift (code below) and have the code set to issue the parameters with the users current location to get alerts where the user is currently.
My problem comes when I attempt to construct the API call to weather.gov in my AlertDataController class(code below). Xcode keeps throwing different errors and I am not sure why. I would like to use a guard statement as I have in my code below, but that throws an error of "Cannot force unwrap value of non-optional type '[[String : Any]]'" in my code where shown. It also throws the same error when I make it a simple constant assignment after unwrapping as the extension returns an optional URL.
The same code works flawlessly when I construct the URL from a string in the guard statement directly as in:
guard let url = URL(string: (baseURL + locationString + stations)) else {
What am I missing? Where my error is thrown is inside the dataTask, and regardless of how it got there, the variable url is an unwrapped URL. Thanks in advance.
Controller class:
import Foundation
import CoreLocation
struct AlertDataController {
func checkWxAlert(location: CLLocation, completion: #escaping (AlertData?) -> Void) {
let baseURL = URL(string: "https://api.weather.gov/alert")!
let locationString = "\(location.coordinate.latitude),\(location.coordinate.longitude)"
var query = [
"active": "1",
"point": locationString
]
guard let url = baseURL.withQueries(query) else {
completion(nil)
print("Unable to build URL in AlertDataController.checkWxAlert with supplied queries.")
return
}
let task = URLSession.shared.dataTask(with: url) { (data, response, error) in
if let data = data,
let rawJSON = try? JSONSerialization.jsonObject(with: data),
let json = rawJSON as? [String: Any],
let featuresDict = json["features"] as? [[String: Any]],
let propertiesArray = featuresDict!["properties"] as? [String: Any] {
Error: Cannot force unwrap value of non-optional type '[[String : Any]]'
let alertData = AlertData(json: propertiesArray)
completion(alertData)
} else {
print("Either no data was returned in AlertDataController.checkWxAlert, or data was not serialized.")
completion(nil)
return
}
}
task.resume()
}
}
URL extension:
import Foundation
extension URL {
func withQueries(_ queries: [String: String]) -> URL? {
var components = URLComponents(url: self, resolvingAgainstBaseURL: true)
components?.queryItems = queries.flatMap { URLQueryItem(name: $0.0, value: $0.1) }
return components?.url
}
func withHTTPS() -> URL? {
var components = URLComponents(url: self, resolvingAgainstBaseURL: true)
components?.scheme = "https"
return components?.url
}
}

Answer 1

If featuresDict is really an array, you cannot use featuresDict["properties"] syntax. That subscript with string syntax is only for dictionaries. But you've apparently got an array of dictionaries.
You could iterate through the featuresDict array (which I'll rename to featuresArray to avoid confusion), you could do that after you finish unwrapping it. Or, if just want an array of the values associated with the properties key for each of those dictionaries, then flatMap is probably a good choice.
For example:
let task = URLSession.shared.dataTask(with: url) { data, _, error in
guard let data = data,
error == nil,
let json = (try? JSONSerialization.jsonObject(with: data)) as? [String: Any],
let featuresArray = json["features"] as? [[String: Any]] else {
print("Either no data was returned in AlertDataController.checkWxAlert, or data was not serialized.")
completion(nil)
return
}
let propertiesArray = featuresArray.flatMap { $0["properties"] }
let alertData = AlertData(json: propertiesArray)
completion(alertData)
}
Or, if AlertData is expecting each of those properties to be, themselves, a dictionary, you might do:
let propertiesArray = featuresArray.flatMap { $0["properties"] as? [String: Any] }
Just replace that cast with whatever type your AlertData is expecting in its array, json.
Or, if you're only interested in the first property, you'd use first rather than flatMap.

Answer 2

The error
Cannot force unwrap value of non-optional type '[[String : Any]]'
is very clear. It occurs because in the optional binding expression featuresDict is already unwrapped when the next condition is evaluated.
Just remove the exclamation mark
... let propertiesArray = featuresDict["properties"] as? [String: Any] {
The error is not related at all to the way the URL is created.