TextField number input using Arabic keyboard - swift

Question

We are using few inputs in our app that use number pad type of keyboard. We are storing that values as Int.
Few days ago we encountered an error with one of our app users which uses Arabic keyboard. When trying to save input to database we encounter error since input is in Arabic symbols and doesn't get recognised as Int.
I wonder how you guys solve this kind of problems. I was thinking of converting input value like this so I created a little extension for String class:
func convertToNumber() -> Int {
let locale = NSLocale(localeIdentifier: "EN")
let formatter = NSNumberFormatter()
formatter.locale = locale
let number = formatter.numberFromString(self)
let returnNumber = Int(number!)
return returnNumber
}
Is there any other better approach?

Answer 1

I used the code below to convert from Arabic numbers "١٢٣٤٥٦٧٨٩٠" to English numbers "1234567890" i'm returning the value as string so maybe this is the difference.
If you still need to return an Int value try to change the code:
let returnNumber = Int(number!)
to
if Int(number!) != nil {
return Int(number!)
}
else{
return -1 //here you can return a value that you can check to decide if an error happen or no.
}
Here is my working code:
extension String {
func arabicNumberToEnglish() -> String{
//if number start with zero then Formatter.number(from: self) will remove it,
//so we need to know how many leading zero contain in the string
//so that we can add them before the return
var leadingZero: String = ""
func getLeadingZero(_ value: String)
{
if value.hasPrefix("0") || value.hasPrefix("٠") {
leadingZero = leadingZero + "0"
var newValue = value
newValue = String(newValue.characters.dropFirst())
getLeadingZero(newValue)
}
else{
return
}
}
//calling the inline function to get the leading zeros count
getLeadingZero(self)
let Formatter: NumberFormatter = NumberFormatter()
Formatter.locale = NSLocale(localeIdentifier: "EN") as Locale!
if let final = Formatter.number(from: self){
// returning the final result after adding the leadingZero's to it.
return leadingZero + "\(final)"
}
else{
return self
}
}
}