How do I asynchronously initialize firebase firestore listeners while also knowing when all of the tasks are done? - swift

Question

Basically, at the launch of my app, I want to load the latest data from firebase from about 4-5 different documents. Then I also want to set up a listener to monitor data changes. I do this by calling 4-5 similar functions that take a dispatchGroup as an argument. I may be approaching this completely wrong but I could not think of any other way to do it. I just want to load those documents, set up listeners, and take certain action whenever those docs are loaded at the launch of the app.
// app launch
let dispatch = DispatchGroup()
getFirebaseDocument1(dispatch: dispatch)
getFirebaseDocument2(dispatch: dispatch)
getFirebaseDocument3(dispatch: dispatch)
getFirebaseDocument4(dispatch: dispatch)
getFirebaseDocument5(dispatch: dispatch)
dispatch.notify(queue:main) {
// execute some code to execute after all the documents are fetched
}
// typical getFirebaseDocument code
dispatch.enter()
let ref = someFirestoreReference
ref.addSnapshotListener { (snapshot, error) in
if let error = error{
// handle error
} else {
// load the document
}
dispatch.leave()
}
The code works fine when it's launched but crashes whenever the listener receives an update. I know this is because the dispatch.leave() is called in the listener function. However, I cannot seem to figure out a clever solution to where I can asynchronously load the data from firebase at launch while also setting up listeners. I would also prefer not to nest closures within one another as it wouldn't be asynchronous and it would also be a pain.

Answer 1

I may be wrong, but you should leave the group inside your block, here is the example how I do it using group
class func getRates(completion: #escaping EmptyBlock) {
let eurRequest = APIConfigs.request(part: "rs/price/history")
let usdRequest = APIConfigs.request(part: "rs/price/history/usd")
let group = DispatchGroup()
group.enter()
sendRequest(request: eurRequest, method: .get, parameters: ServerParameters.rates()) { response in
Course.current.addRate(rates: ratesRequest(response: response), type: .eur)
group.leave()
}
group.enter()
sendRequest(request: usdRequest, method: .get, parameters: ServerParameters.rates()) { response in
Course.current.addRate(rates: ratesRequest(response: response), type: .usd)
group.leave()
}
group.notify(queue: .main) {
completion()
}
}