Swift only way to prevent NSKeyedUnarchiver.decodeObject crash?

another way is to fix the name of the class used for NSCoding. You simply have to use:

• NSKeyedArchiver.setClassName("List", forClass: List.self before serializing
• NSKeyedUnarchiver.setClass(List.self, forClassName: "List") before deserializing

wherever needed.

Looks like iOS extensions prefix the class name with the extension's name.

Actually, it's the reason which we should dig deeply matters. There's a possible, you create a archive path named xxx.archive, then you unarchive from the path(xxx.archive), now everything is ok. But if change target name, when you unarchive, the crash occurred!!! It's because archive&unarchive the different object(the truth is we archive&unarchive target.obj, not just the obj). so simple way is to delete the archive path or just use a different archive path. And then we should consider how avoid the crash, try-catch is our helper mentioned by rintaro.

When NSKeyedUnarchiver encounters unknown classes, unarchiver(_:cannotDecodeObjectOfClassName:originalClasses:) delegate method is called.

The delegate may, for example, load some code to introduce the class to the runtime and return the class, or substitute a different class object. If the delegate returns nil, unarchiving aborts and the method raises an NSInvalidUnarchiveOperationException.

So, you can implement the delegate like this:

class MyUnArchiverDelegate: NSObject, NSKeyedUnarchiverDelegate {

    // This class is placeholder for unknown classes.
    // It will eventually be `nil` when decoded.
    final class Unknown: NSObject, NSCoding  {
        init?(coder aDecoder: NSCoder) { super.init(); return nil }
        func encodeWithCoder(aCoder: NSCoder) {}
    }

    func unarchiver(unarchiver: NSKeyedUnarchiver, cannotDecodeObjectOfClassName name: String, originalClasses classNames: [String]) -> AnyClass? {
        return Unknown.self
    }
}

Then:

let unarchiver = NSKeyedUnarchiver(forReadingWithData: dat)
let delegate = MyUnArchiverDelegate()
unarchiver.delegate = delegate

unarchiver.decodeObjectForKey("root")
// -> `nil` if the root object is unknown class.

---

ADDED:

I didn't noticed that NSCoder has extension with more swifty methods:

extension NSCoder {
    @warn_unused_result
    public func decodeObjectOfClass<DecodedObjectType : NSCoding where DecodedObjectType : NSObject>(cls: DecodedObjectType.Type, forKey key: String) -> DecodedObjectType?
    @warn_unused_result
    @nonobjc public func decodeObjectOfClasses(classes: NSSet?, forKey key: String) -> AnyObject?
    @warn_unused_result
    public func decodeTopLevelObject() throws -> AnyObject?
    @warn_unused_result
    public func decodeTopLevelObjectForKey(key: String) throws -> AnyObject?
    @warn_unused_result
    public func decodeTopLevelObjectOfClass<DecodedObjectType : NSCoding where DecodedObjectType : NSObject>(cls: DecodedObjectType.Type, forKey key: String) throws -> DecodedObjectType?
    @warn_unused_result
    public func decodeTopLevelObjectOfClasses(classes: NSSet?, forKey key: String) throws -> AnyObject?
}

You can:

do {
    try unarchiver.decodeTopLevelObjectForKey("root")
    // OR `unarchiver.decodeTopLevelObject()` depends on how you archived.
}
catch let (err) {
    print(err)
}
// -> emits something like:
// Error Domain=NSCocoaErrorDomain Code=4864 "*** -[NSKeyedUnarchiver decodeObjectForKey:]: cannot decode object of class (MyProject.MyClass) for key (root); the class may be defined in source code or a library that is not linked" UserInfo={NSDebugDescription=*** -[NSKeyedUnarchiver decodeObjectForKey:]: cannot decode object of class (MyProject.MyClass) for key (root); the class may be defined in source code or a library that is not linked}