Why Kotlin is my next programming language (2015)
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Re: Why Kotlin is my next programming language (2015)
#2I tried Kotlin during the Surprise Language round of Codeforces, a programming competition.
I found it to be more verbose than a typical modern scripting language. Maybe it's the result of choosing the least of the evils for what it's trying to accomplish.
The other drawback: the documentation. Kotlin's reference documentation (looking up how to properly use a call) does not have any examples. I'm not even talking about full compilable examples - although that would be nice, it doesn't even have one-liner examples. FWIW, I was trying to look up how to use a comparator to sort a MutableArray.
Re: Why Kotlin is my next programming language (2015)
#3Yeah. No.
Re: Why Kotlin is my next programming language (2015)
#4I really liked Scala when I played around with it (bare with me here), but when deciding on what to use on a project I'm starting, targeting the JVM is a downside. Can I depend on the JVM being on the target machine? If not, I'll have to deal with the dependency. However, if I choose a compiled language like Rust, I don't have to worry about that.
Re: Why Kotlin is my next programming language (2015)
#5I tried Kotlin during the Surprise Language round of Codeforces, a programming competition. I found it to be more verbose than a typical modern scripting language. Maybe it's the result of choosing the least of the evils for what it's trying to accomplish. The other drawback: the documentation. Kotlin's reference documentation (looking up how to properly use a call) does not have any examples. I'm not even talking ab…
Personally I don't much mind the added verbosity, coming from Ruby/Python/JS, so long as I don't have to write so many damn tests. Speaking from minimal experience, Kotlin still seems like a big net win here. Same is true of other languages with lightweight, static type systems like TypeScript/Flow, Swift, and Go.
I agree about the documentation – I think it's one of the biggest reasons the language has seen such little adoption given its benefits.
I couldn't even find how to integrate Kotlin files into a Java project without using IntelliJ. Kotlin is developed by Jetbrains, so of course they're used to IDE-driven-development, and have a financial stake in people using their products for development. But coming from scripting languages, this sort of documentation gap was a real turn-off for me.
Re: Why Kotlin is my next programming language (2015)
#6I tried Kotlin during the Surprise Language round of Codeforces, a programming competition. I found it to be more verbose than a typical modern scripting language. Maybe it's the result of choosing the least of the evils for what it's trying to accomplish. The other drawback: the documentation. Kotlin's reference documentation (looking up how to properly use a call) does not have any examples. I'm not even talking ab…
Personally I don't much mind the added verbosity, coming from Ruby/Python/JS, so long as I don't have to write so many damn tests. Speaking from minimal experience, Kotlin still seems like a big net win here. Same is true of other languages with lightweight, static type systems like TypeScript/Flow, Swift, and Go. I agree about the documentation – I think it's one of the biggest reasons the language has seen such lit…
What is it that makes you not having to write so many tests?
Re: Why Kotlin is my next programming language (2015)
#7Should probably be renamed "Why Kotlin is my current programming language".
Re: Why Kotlin is my next programming language (2015)
#8Earlier quoted context omitted.
Personally I don't much mind the added verbosity, coming from Ruby/Python/JS, so long as I don't have to write so many damn tests. Speaking from minimal experience, Kotlin still seems like a big net win here. Same is true of other languages with lightweight, static type systems like TypeScript/Flow, Swift, and Go. I agree about the documentation – I think it's one of the biggest reasons the language has seen such lit…
What is it that makes you not having to write so many tests?
A decent type system
Re: Why Kotlin is my next programming language (2015)
#9I really liked Scala when I played around with it (bare with me here), but when deciding on what to use on a project I'm starting, targeting the JVM is a downside. Can I depend on the JVM being on the target machine? If not, I'll have to deal with the dependency. However, if I choose a compiled language like Rust, I don't have to worry about that.
Most people writing Java will be able to control the presence of the JVM. Only B2C desktop apps, which are fairly rare these days, will have to worry much about the dependency.
Re: Why Kotlin is my next programming language (2015)
#10Earlier quoted context omitted.
Personally I don't much mind the added verbosity, coming from Ruby/Python/JS, so long as I don't have to write so many damn tests. Speaking from minimal experience, Kotlin still seems like a big net win here. Same is true of other languages with lightweight, static type systems like TypeScript/Flow, Swift, and Go. I agree about the documentation – I think it's one of the biggest reasons the language has seen such lit…
What is it that makes you not having to write so many tests?
Static typing.