Why can't I initialize a static variable by calling a static function in Swift?

Question

It is my understanding that as of Xcode 6.3 / Swift 1.2, I can use static variables and methods inside of a class. However, the compiler doesn't like it when I try to initialize a static variable by calling a static function (I get the error 'Use of unresolved identifier getDefaultString' in the example below). Here is a snippet that demonstrates my problem:

import Foundation

public class Settings {
    private static var _bundle = NSBundle.mainBundle()
    static func getDefaultString(key: String) -> String {
        return _bundle.objectForInfoDictionaryKey(key) as! String
    }

    private static var _server = getDefaultString("DefaultServer")
    public class var server: String {
        get { return _server }
        set { _server = newValue }
    }
}

Can someone help me understand why I can't do this?

Answer 1

This should work:

private static var _server = Settings.getDefaultString("DefaultServer")

I do not know exactly why, it seems that there is some sort of an assumption in the play that a method without type qualified in front of it is an instance method. But that does not fully work as well. E.g. this produces interesting result in playground:

    class Foo {

        static func initFoo() -> String {
            return "static"
        }

        func initFoo() -> String {
            return "instance"
        }

        static var foo: String = initFoo()

    }

    Foo.foo

... no need to qualify type in front of initFoo(), but still the static one is picked up. A minor bug probably.