Early return from a function which has a return type of [String] in Swift 3

Question

I have a function which returns an Array of String if some conditions are met. But I want to have the early return functionality in my function. Something like this:

func fetchPerson() -> [String] {
    guard let appDelegate = UIApplication.shared.delegate as? AppDelegate else {
        return nil
    }
    .......
    .......
}

But I'm facing issues like:

Nil is incompatible with return type '[String]'

I tried writing only return statement. But it fails too. What to do?

Edit: 1

What if I just want to return back from this function without any value. Just back to the line where the call to this function happened. Something like:

func fetchPerson() -> [String] {
    guard let appDelegate = UIApplication.shared.delegate as? AppDelegate else {
        return //return to the line where function call was made
    }
    .......
    .......
}

Answer 1

You can solved this error two ways.

• Either change return type to [String]? from [String] means make return type optional.

  func fetchPerson() -> [String]? {
      guard let appDelegate = UIApplication.shared.delegate as? AppDelegate else {
          return nil
      }
      .......
      .......
  }
  

• Either Change return statement to return [] from return nil means return empty array.

  func fetchPerson() -> [String] {
      guard let appDelegate = UIApplication.shared.delegate as? AppDelegate else {
          return []
      }
      .......
      .......
  }