get the first entry in an entity on Core Data

Question

I was wondering how to get the first item from an entity in core data without using fetch?

Reason i asked is because i placed the settings file onto core data instead of creating a separate file to hold the values. Because when ever the app is updated, the separate file gets blown off and core data is migrated. if i placed the user's settings onto a file, it is not preserved when the app is updated. Core data is preserved (give or take some hoops).

I know how to fetch but is there any other way (easier way) to just get the 1st entry on the core data entity?

Answer 1

I am afraid you have to go through the motions of fetching. You can make it very efficient by setting the fetchLimit to 1. With the available convenience methods it is really very short, both in Swift and Objective-C.

var request = NSFetchRequest(entityName:"Event")
request.fetchLimit = 1
let result = context.executeFetchRequest(request, error:nil) as [Event]
if countElements(result) == 1 {
   let event = result.first! as Event
   // do something with event
}

or

NSFetchRequest *request = [NSFetchRequest fetchRequestWithEntityName:@"Event"];
request.fetchLimit = 1;
NSArray *result = [context executeFetchRequest:request error:nil];
if (result.count) {
    Event *event = result.firstObject;
    // do something with event
}