It is also fully compatible with Java, which makes switching over much easier. A distinct part of the developer community for Java originates from India. India has a large population of junior developers, and Java is fairly simple to learn, so many students begin learning with Java. This trend extends beyond India as well, with junior developers across the world beginning their education with Java. In Kotlin, the variable specification data type is not required, while in Java, the variable data type is required.
These include features such as lambda expressions, extension functions, function builders, type inference, and multiplatform support. Java is a very versatile programming language that has greatly influenced the development of many other languages. Programming languages including JavaScript, JS++, C#, Python, PHP, Scala or even Kotlin are all considered to be among the programming languages influenced by Java. The graph below shows the current trend in Kotlin’s favour vs Java and other alternative technologies.
Global Variables
Actually, to be honest, Kotlin is Java with some extra pieces of stuff. Those languages can be used in parallel in the same kotlin development team project. For example, you can easily use JAVA libraries in Kotlin’s project, but Kotlin gives you more out of the box.
Developers who are already familiar with Java are falling in love with Kotlin because of its short syntax, and actually encouraging beginners to start with Kotlin. However, I would rather encourage a beginner to start with Java. The guys at JetBrains are the same ones who develop and manage Android Studio IDE – Google’s official Android developer tool. By the time of the release of Kotlin v1.0, Kotlin was fast gaining momentum around Android developer communities with plugins for most IDEs already being used. There are many more features we could compare between Java and Kotlin. But what I’ve discussed here are, in my opinion, some of the most important.
Primitive Types
So, Kotlin, Java, and C++ are the officially supported languages. Using any languages other than them will be a hacky process. If you want to build apps with python then you have to have a way to convert python code into byte code that the VM understands. I am afraid there is official support for this kind of conversion like Kotlin.
It is a very concise language, which reduces the chances of making errors and simplifies the developers’ work. The developer needs to only include the data keyword in the class definition, and that’s it. The compiler will take care of the entire task on its own. Kotlin is a cross-platform, statically typed, general-purpose language developed by JetBrains. Primarily, Java was used for developing Android applications, but it’s become an ideal choice for big data, ecommerce, and enterprise systems. Companies like Netflix, AppleTV, Hybris, and ATG all use this technology.
Clarity, interoperability, safety, and tooling support are all priorities. Anonymous functions, closures, generics, higher-order functions, inline functions, lambdas, and tail recursion are also supported by the language. Kotlin, in other words, offers all of the benefits and characteristics of a functional language. Kotlin versions for JavaScript ES5.1 and android native development kit (using LLVM) for various processors are also available. Kotlin is object-oriented and supports functional programming features.
- This makes the code more readable and simpler, which generally also leads to the code being of better quality because bugs and errors are easier to find.
- Thus, Kotlin’s developers do not require to catch or declare exceptions.
- Their interoperability implies Java is not going to be replaced.
- There are a few things worth knowing about these when it comes to Kotlin.
- As seen in the Kotlin code above, we can use type inference to declare a variable without explicitly specifying its data type.
- Kotlin compiles into bytecode that executes on top of JVM hence Java is necessary for running Kotlin.
Both Kotlin and Java compile to bytecode that runs on the JVM, which means they have similar performance characteristics. The code above is a simple “Hello, World!” program in Java that prints “Hello, World! Here is another example showing the difference between the verbose syntax of Java and a more concise Kotlin syntax. As you can see, the Kotlin version is much more concise and readable than the Java version.
Of course, Java has been around for years, and the IT industry has an abundance of Java developers — but that’s not the case with Kotlin. The market is still struggling to cope with the demand of the language, and is not able to completely fulfill the supply portion. Basically, Kotlin’s Data Classes are like regular classes but with some additional functionality. Is’ or ‘is’ check on a variable, the compiler tracks this information and will automatically cast the variable to the target type where is the ‘! The Kotlin library offers conventional interfaces, training, and functions for developing, populating, and coping with collections of any type.
Just like Java was named after an Indonesian island, Kotlin was also named after Kotlin Island near St. Petersburg. The team at JetBrains hopes that Kotlin will drive the sales and growth of their IntelliJ IDEA. With the amount of people in the Java community, it’s much easier to find references and get help when you need it, both on the Internet and in the real world. They allow a class to have new functionality without extending it into the class or using any of the fancy Design Patterns. It even lets you to add functionality to Kotlin variable classes.
