How to use hex color values

Question

I am trying to use hex color values in Swift, instead of the few standard ones that UIColor allows you to use, but I have no idea how to do it.

Example: how would I use #ffffff as a color?

Answer 1

Supporting 7 Hex color types

There are 7 hex color formats: ""#FF0000","0xFF0000", "FF0000", "F00", "red", 0x00FF00 , 16711935

NSColorParser.nsColor("#FF0000",1)//red nsColor
NSColorParser.nsColor("FF0",1)//red nsColor
NSColorParser.nsColor("0xFF0000",1)//red nsColor
NSColorParser.nsColor("#FF0000",1)//red nsColor
NSColorParser.nsColor("FF0000",1)//red nsColor
NSColorParser.nsColor(0xFF0000,1)//red nsColor
NSColorParser.nsColor(16711935,1)//red nsColor

CAUTION: This isn't a "one-file-solution", there are some dependencies, but hunting them down may be faster than researching this from scratch.

https://github.com/eonist/swift-utils/blob/2882002682c4d2a3dc7cb3045c45f66ed59d566d/geom/color/NSColorParser.swift

Permalink:
https://github.com/eonist/Element/wiki/Progress#supporting-7-hex-color-types

Answer 2

The Swift 4 version looks like this:

extension UIColor {
convenience init(hexString: String, alpha: CGFloat = 1.0) {
    let hexString: String = hexString.trimmingCharacters(in: CharacterSet.whitespacesAndNewlines)
    let scanner = Scanner(string: hexString)
    if (hexString.hasPrefix("#")) {
        scanner.scanLocation = 1
    }
    var color: UInt32 = 0
    scanner.scanHexInt32(&color)
    let mask = 0x000000FF
    let r = Int(color >> 16) & mask
    let g = Int(color >> 8) & mask
    let b = Int(color) & mask
    let red   = CGFloat(r) / 255.0
    let green = CGFloat(g) / 255.0
    let blue  = CGFloat(b) / 255.0
    self.init(red:red, green:green, blue:blue, alpha:alpha)
}
func toHexString() -> String {
    var r:CGFloat = 0
    var g:CGFloat = 0
    var b:CGFloat = 0
    var a:CGFloat = 0
    getRed(&r, green: &g, blue: &b, alpha: &a)
    let rgb:Int = (Int)(r*255)<<16 | (Int)(g*255)<<8 | (Int)(b*255)<<0
    return String(format:"#%06x", rgb)
 }
}

Answer 3

Hex with validation

Based on Eduardo answer

Deatails

Xcode 10.0, Swift 4.2

Solution

extension UIColor {

    convenience init(r: UInt8, g: UInt8, b: UInt8, alpha: CGFloat = 1.0) {
        let divider: CGFloat = 255.0
        self.init(red: CGFloat(r)/divider, green: CGFloat(g)/divider, blue: CGFloat(b)/divider, alpha: alpha)
    }

    private convenience init(rgbWithoutValidation value: Int32, alpha: CGFloat = 1.0) {
        self.init(
            r: UInt8((value & 0xFF0000) >> 16),
            g: UInt8((value & 0x00FF00) >> 8),
            b: UInt8(value & 0x0000FF),
            alpha: alpha
        )
    }

    convenience init?(rgb: Int32, alpha: CGFloat = 1.0) {
        if rgb > 0xFFFFFF || rgb < 0 {
            return nil
        }
        self.init(rgbWithoutValidation: rgb, alpha: alpha)
    }

    convenience init?(hex: String, alpha: CGFloat = 1.0) {
        var charSet = CharacterSet.whitespacesAndNewlines
        charSet.insert("#")
        let _hex = hex.trimmingCharacters(in: charSet)
        guard _hex.range(of: "^[0-9A-Fa-f]{6}$", options: .regularExpression) != nil else {
            return nil
        }
        var rgb: UInt32 = 0
        Scanner(string: _hex).scanHexInt32(&rgb)
        self.init(rgbWithoutValidation: Int32(rgb), alpha: alpha)
    }
}

Usage

let alpha: CGFloat = 1.0

// Hex
print(UIColor(rgb: 0x4F9BF5) ?? "nil")
print(UIColor(rgb: 0x4F9BF5, alpha: alpha) ?? "nil")
print(UIColor(rgb: 5217269) ?? "nil")
print(UIColor(rgb: -5217269) ?? "nil")                  // = nil
print(UIColor(rgb: 0xFFFFFF1) ?? "nil")                 // = nil

// String
print(UIColor(hex: "4F9BF5") ?? "nil")
print(UIColor(hex: "4F9BF5", alpha: alpha) ?? "nil")
print(UIColor(hex: "#4F9BF5") ?? "nil")
print(UIColor(hex: "#4F9BF5", alpha: alpha) ?? "nil")
print(UIColor(hex: "#4F9BF56") ?? "nil")                // = nil
print(UIColor(hex: "#blabla") ?? "nil")                 // = nil

// RGB
print(UIColor(r: 79, g: 155, b: 245))
print(UIColor(r: 79, g: 155, b: 245, alpha: alpha))
//print(UIColor(r: 792, g: 155, b: 245, alpha: alpha))  // Compiler will throw an error, r,g,b = [0...255]

Answer 4

Swift 4 UIColor extension:

extension UIColor {
    convenience init(hexString: String) {
        let hex = hexString.trimmingCharacters(in: CharacterSet.alphanumerics.inverted)
        var int = UInt32()
        Scanner(string: hex).scanHexInt32(&int)
        let a, r, g, b: UInt32
        switch hex.count {
        case 3: // RGB (12-bit)
            (a, r, g, b) = (255, (int >> 8) * 17, (int >> 4 & 0xF) * 17, (int & 0xF) * 17)
        case 6: // RGB (24-bit)
            (a, r, g, b) = (255, int >> 16, int >> 8 & 0xFF, int & 0xFF)
        case 8: // ARGB (32-bit)
            (a, r, g, b) = (int >> 24, int >> 16 & 0xFF, int >> 8 & 0xFF, int & 0xFF)
        default:
            (a, r, g, b) = (255, 0, 0, 0)
        }
        self.init(red: CGFloat(r) / 255, green: CGFloat(g) / 255, blue: CGFloat(b) / 255, alpha: CGFloat(a) / 255)
    }
}

Usage:

let darkGrey = UIColor(hexString: "#757575")

Swift 2.x version:

extension UIColor {
    convenience init(hexString: String) {
        let hex = hexString.stringByTrimmingCharactersInSet(NSCharacterSet.alphanumericCharacterSet().invertedSet)
        var int = UInt32()
        NSScanner(string: hex).scanHexInt(&int)
        let a, r, g, b: UInt32
        switch hex.characters.count {
        case 3: // RGB (12-bit)
            (a, r, g, b) = (255, (int >> 8) * 17, (int >> 4 & 0xF) * 17, (int & 0xF) * 17)
        case 6: // RGB (24-bit)
            (a, r, g, b) = (255, int >> 16, int >> 8 & 0xFF, int & 0xFF)
        case 8: // ARGB (32-bit)
            (a, r, g, b) = (int >> 24, int >> 16 & 0xFF, int >> 8 & 0xFF, int & 0xFF)
        default:
            (a, r, g, b) = (255, 0, 0, 0)
        }
        self.init(red: CGFloat(r) / 255, green: CGFloat(g) / 255, blue: CGFloat(b) / 255, alpha: CGFloat(a) / 255)
    }
}

Answer 5

RGBA Version Swift 3/4

I like @Luca's answer as i think it's the most elegant.

However I don't want my colours specified in ARGB. I'd rather RGBA + also i needed to hack in the case of dealing with strings that specify 1 character for each of the channels "#FFFA".

This version also adds error throwing + strips the '#' character if it's included in the string. Here is my modified form for Swift.

public enum ColourParsingError: Error
{

    case invalidInput(String)
}
extension UIColor {
    public convenience init(hexString: String) throws
    {
        let hexString = hexString.replacingOccurrences(of: "#", with: "")
        let hex = hexString.trimmingCharacters(in:NSCharacterSet.alphanumerics.inverted)
        var int = UInt32()
        Scanner(string: hex).scanHexInt32(&int)
        let a, r, g, b: UInt32
        switch hex.count 
        {
        case 3: // RGB (12-bit)
            (r, g, b,a) = ((int >> 8) * 17, (int >> 4 & 0xF) * 17, (int & 0xF) * 17,255)
        //iCSS specification in the form of #F0FA
        case 4: // RGB (24-bit)
            (r, g, b,a) = ((int >> 12) * 17, (int >> 8 & 0xF) * 17, (int >> 4 & 0xF) * 17, (int & 0xF) * 17)
        case 6: // RGB (24-bit)
            (r, g, b, a) = (int >> 16, int >> 8 & 0xFF, int & 0xFF,255)
        case 8: // ARGB (32-bit)
            (r, g, b, a) = (int >> 24, int >> 16 & 0xFF, int >> 8 & 0xFF, int & 0xFF)
        default:
            throw ColourParsingError.invalidInput("String is not a valid hex colour string: \(hexString)")
        }
        self.init(red: CGFloat(r) / 255, green: CGFloat(g) / 255, blue: CGFloat(b) / 255, alpha: CGFloat(a) / 255)
    }
}

Answer 6

#ffffff are actually 3 color components in hexadecimal notation - red ff, green ff and blue ff. You can write hexadecimal notation in Swift using 0x prefix, e.g 0xFF

To simplify the conversion, let's create an initializer that takes integer (0 - 255) values:

extension UIColor {
   convenience init(red: Int, green: Int, blue: Int) {
       assert(red >= 0 && red <= 255, "Invalid red component")
       assert(green >= 0 && green <= 255, "Invalid green component")
       assert(blue >= 0 && blue <= 255, "Invalid blue component")

       self.init(red: CGFloat(red) / 255.0, green: CGFloat(green) / 255.0, blue: CGFloat(blue) / 255.0, alpha: 1.0)
   }

   convenience init(rgb: Int) {
       self.init(
           red: (rgb >> 16) & 0xFF,
           green: (rgb >> 8) & 0xFF,
           blue: rgb & 0xFF
       )
   }
}

Usage:

let color = UIColor(red: 0xFF, green: 0xFF, blue: 0xFF)
let color2 = UIColor(rgb: 0xFFFFFF)

How to get alpha?

Depending on your use case, you can simply use the native UIColor.withAlphaComponent method, e.g.

let semitransparentBlack = UIColor(rgb: 0x000000).withAlphaComponent(0.5)

Or you can add an additional (optional) parameter to the above methods:

convenience init(red: Int, green: Int, blue: Int, a: CGFloat = 1.0) {
    self.init(
        red: CGFloat(red) / 255.0,
        green: CGFloat(green) / 255.0,
        blue: CGFloat(blue) / 255.0,
        alpha: a
    )
}

convenience init(rgb: Int, a: CGFloat = 1.0) {
    self.init(
        red: (rgb >> 16) & 0xFF,
        green: (rgb >> 8) & 0xFF,
        blue: rgb & 0xFF,
        a: a
    )
}

(we cannot name the parameter alpha because of a name collision with the existing initializer).

Called as:

let color = UIColor(red: 0xFF, green: 0xFF, blue: 0xFF, a: 0.5)
let color2 = UIColor(rgb: 0xFFFFFF, a: 0.5)

To get the alpha as an integer 0-255, we can

convenience init(red: Int, green: Int, blue: Int, a: Int = 0xFF) {
    self.init(
        red: CGFloat(red) / 255.0,
        green: CGFloat(green) / 255.0,
        blue: CGFloat(blue) / 255.0,
        alpha: CGFloat(a) / 255.0
    )
}

// let's suppose alpha is the first component (ARGB)
convenience init(argb: Int) {
    self.init(
        red: (argb >> 16) & 0xFF,
        green: (argb >> 8) & 0xFF,
        blue: argb & 0xFF,
        a: (argb >> 24) & 0xFF
    )
}

Called as

let color = UIColor(red: 0xFF, green: 0xFF, blue: 0xFF, a: 0xFF)
let color2 = UIColor(argb: 0xFFFFFFFF)

Or a combination of the previous methods. There is absolutely no need to use strings.