var str = "Hello, playground"

extension String {
    var stringByDeletingLastCharacter: String {
        return dropLast(self)
    }
}

println(str.stringByDeletingLastCharacter)   // "Hello, playgroun"

let str = "abc"
let substr = str.substringToIndex(str.endIndex.predecessor())  // "ab"

这是一个字符串扩展表单:

extension String {

    func removeCharsFromEnd(count_:Int) -> String {
        let stringLength = count(self)

        let substringIndex = (stringLength < count_) ? 0 : stringLength - count_

        return self.substringToIndex(advance(self.startIndex, substringIndex))
    }
}

对于Swift 1.2之前的版本:

...
let stringLength = countElements(self)
...

用法:

var str_1 = "Maxim"
println("output: \(str_1.removeCharsFromEnd(1))") // "Maxi"
println("output: \(str_1.removeCharsFromEnd(3))") // "Ma"
println("output: \(str_1.removeCharsFromEnd(8))") // ""

参考:

扩展向现有的类、结构或枚举类型添加新功能。这包括扩展您无法访问原始源代码的类型的能力(称为回溯建模)。扩展类似于Objective-C中的类别。(与Objective-C类别不同，Swift扩展没有名称。)

看文档

import UIKit

var str1 = "Hello, playground"
str1.removeLast()
print(str1)

var str2 = "Hello, playground"
str2.removeLast(3)
print(str2)

var str3 = "Hello, playground"
str3.removeFirst(2)
print(str3)

Output:-
Hello, playgroun
Hello, playgro
llo, playground

Swift 3(根据文档)2016年11月20日

let range = expression.index(expression.endIndex, offsetBy: -numberOfCharactersToRemove)..<expression.endIndex
expression.removeSubrange(range)

补充上述代码，我想删除字符串的开头，但在任何地方都找不到引用。以下是我的做法:

var mac = peripheral.identifier.description
let range = mac.startIndex..<mac.endIndex.advancedBy(-50)
mac.removeRange(range)  // trim 17 characters from the beginning
let txPower = peripheral.advertisements.txPower?.description

这将从字符串的开头修剪17个字符(字符串的总长度是67，从末尾向前移动-50，就得到了它。