11 ms·

WTF? Some people are spending serious money on a PR campaign to promote Kotlin this week!

by eng_monkey 9y ago

la_oveja 9y ago
Couldn't be that people are actually hyped about Kotlin?
- frogfuzion 9y ago
  Couldn't it be that we are all hyped about Kotlin because we read a new article about how incredible it is every 10 minutes? Chicken and egg.
  - aquadrop 9y ago
    No, because Google dropped huge announcement that Kotlin will be first-class citizen on Andorid. And there were people who like Kotlin, but knew it will be hard to use it in real life. They are happy now and having a moment. With time this wave will decrease, and something other will come. That's normal.
frogfuzion 9y ago
I think it would behoove you to use Kotlin. When every other post on this board is about Kotlin, it is clear that is where the industry is headed. Use Kotlin, or risk being left behind. Edit: Kotlin. Kotlin. more Kotlin.
- bbcbasic 9y ago
  Successful in spite the of the name
- gagege 9y ago
  "But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Kotlin" - George Orwell
- sidlls 9y ago
  Um, no. What happens on HN is nowhere near an industry driver. It's better than many forums, but it's not some powerhouse of technology industry influence, nor does a trending topic on HN necessarily indicate a particular trend in the industry in general.
Lewton 9y ago
I wouldn't be surprised if money wasn't involved, HN has always worked like this. Some tech post about some technology gets a ton of votes, some people get excited about the tech, they investigate and find articles about that tech, they share it, and all the excited people upvote it. Has happened several times with Rust, Go, Ember, Meteor, Angular, TypeScript, etc etc This time android support and that steve yegge blog post set it off (it probably wasn't an accident that these two coincided though?) It's like an echo-chamber with ADHD
techno_modus 9y ago
Is it possible that Google views JetBrains as an acquisition target?
- jayd16 9y ago
  Anything is possible but I believe both parties have stated they're happy with their current relationship and no one is looking for acquisition.
- matwood 9y ago
  I have been hoping for this move, and then Google using Kotlin for Android. They made the smaller step of officially endorsing Kotlin which I think helps, but acquiring Jetbrains and opening the entire Intellij would be huge for the developer community, Android, Kotlin, etc... Of course that assumes Google doesn't drop support a year later.
  - m_fayer 9y ago
    Yeah, please, no. Jetbrains have been a consistent, effective, and mature presence in this world for a long time. The last thing I would want would be to inflict Google's capricious approach to acquisitions on such a valuable player.
m_fayer 9y ago
As someone who's become adept with a few modern statically typed languages (C#, TypeScript, F#), and still sometimes has to write (pull teeth) crufty old Java for Android development, I can tell you that I'm happily pitching into this PR campaign unpaid and of my own volition.
StevePerkins 9y ago
1. Android is the largest mobile platform on the planet. 2. It's been around for a decade now, but has only supported development with Java and C++. 3. The most recent version of Java supported comes from 2011. And full C++ support is only recent. 4. Few people (if any) really like these options. 5. This week Google announced that Kotlin is the next "official" language with first-class support. 6. A temporary wave of stories appear on HN. Are you new here? I'm sure that next week it'll go back to the usual threads about Rust or Haskell, or someone will start a retro fad around Algol-68 or something.
- pjmlp 9y ago
  What?! C++ might be a 2nd class citizen in SDK tooling, but it is supported since Android 1.5 and C++14 is fully supported. How is that very recent? EDIT: The NDK was actually released with v1.5 (2009), the v2.3 was when STL and exceptions support were added hence my error.
  - _pmf_ 9y ago
    Maybe the OP meant using C++ without at least a Application dispatcher/container object written in Java. This has only been possible with the introduction of NativeActivity (which you don't need to derive from, but only refer to via the Manifest).
    - pjmlp 9y ago
      The NativeActivity class was introduced in Android 2.3, released in December 2010, almost 7 years ago!
  - krona 9y ago
    Historically the Android platform provided only a very minimal C++ runtime support library, with no RTTI or C++ exceptions.
    - pjmlp 9y ago
      STL and exceptions are available since Android NDK Revision 5, released in December 2010, alongside Android 2.3. https://developer.android.com/ndk/downloads/revision_history.html https://developer.android.com/ndk/downloads/revision_history... How can it be historically, when the features are available since almost 7 years?
rovek 9y ago
News tends to follow current events.
furrydog 9y ago
Kotlin is simply a much more modern option than Java in general, and doubly so for the old version of Java used for Android. Giving Kotlin some official backing gives it a lot of credibility. The big argument favour of using Java over Kotlin until now has been that Kotlin was seen as more of a fringe language than the one (Java) officially endorsed by Google. Now that has changed. As a Scala developer I'm quite happy that Kotlin is getting this much attention as I see it as Scala-lite. I doubt there's a campaign of any sort, just lots of excited developers who are sick of Java and excited about Kotlin.
madiathomas 9y ago
People are just excited. Articles I have seen so far don't sound like PR. People are just excited that they will have an alternative to Java. This is the same kind of an excitement as the one when Apple announced that Swift will be a first class citizen of iOS development. I rarely get excited with programming languages, but this one went straight to my heart. Maybe I am biased because I like JetBrains as a company.
oblio 9y ago
The same thing of thing happens during/immediately after Google I/O, Microsoft Build, Apple WWDC(?), etc. Hype can also occur (somewhat) naturally. It does happen.
giancarlostoro 9y ago
To put it into more perspective, I live in Orlando and Kotlin has been the new growing language for Android since before the announcement. Developers wind up trying Kotlin for themselves and enjoying it for themselves, the rising numbers and the fact Google realized it's popularity and adjusted their support for it shows that Kotlin is a reasonable solution for Android development. It also doesn't help the fact that Java is hostile against Android, and that Kotlin is working on native compilation, which could make it one day one of the most powerful assets of Android if they go full on for native compilation for Android, a benefit that afaik Java doesn't have.
AlexeyBrin 9y ago
You see too much into this. It was the same wave of HN interest when Swift was launched, back in 2014. Or when RubyMotion was announced a few years ago. People are simply excited about being able to use Kotlin as an official alternative to Java on Android. I'm also pretty excited about this ...

WTF? Some people are spending serious money on a PR campaign to promote Kotlin this week!

la_oveja 9y ago

Couldn't be that people are actually hyped about Kotlin?

frogfuzion 9y ago
Couldn't it be that we are all hyped about Kotlin because we read a new article about how incredible it is every 10 minutes? Chicken and egg.
- aquadrop 9y ago
  No, because Google dropped huge announcement that Kotlin will be first-class citizen on Andorid. And there were people who like Kotlin, but knew it will be hard to use it in real life. They are happy now and having a moment. With time this wave will decrease, and something other will come. That's normal.

frogfuzion 9y ago

I think it would behoove you to use Kotlin. When every other post on this board is about Kotlin, it is clear that is where the industry is headed. Use Kotlin, or risk being left behind. Edit: Kotlin. Kotlin. more Kotlin.

bbcbasic 9y ago
Successful in spite the of the name
gagege 9y ago
"But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Kotlin" - George Orwell
sidlls 9y ago
Um, no. What happens on HN is nowhere near an industry driver. It's better than many forums, but it's not some powerhouse of technology industry influence, nor does a trending topic on HN necessarily indicate a particular trend in the industry in general.

Lewton 9y ago

I wouldn't be surprised if money wasn't involved, HN has always worked like this. Some tech post about some technology gets a ton of votes, some people get excited about the tech, they investigate and find articles about that tech, they share it, and all the excited people upvote it. Has happened several times with Rust, Go, Ember, Meteor, Angular, TypeScript, etc etc This time android support and that steve yegge blog post set it off (it probably wasn't an accident that these two coincided though?) It's like an echo-chamber with ADHD

techno_modus 9y ago

Is it possible that Google views JetBrains as an acquisition target?

jayd16 9y ago
Anything is possible but I believe both parties have stated they're happy with their current relationship and no one is looking for acquisition.
matwood 9y ago
I have been hoping for this move, and then Google using Kotlin for Android. They made the smaller step of officially endorsing Kotlin which I think helps, but acquiring Jetbrains and opening the entire Intellij would be huge for the developer community, Android, Kotlin, etc... Of course that assumes Google doesn't drop support a year later.
- m_fayer 9y ago
  Yeah, please, no. Jetbrains have been a consistent, effective, and mature presence in this world for a long time. The last thing I would want would be to inflict Google's capricious approach to acquisitions on such a valuable player.

m_fayer 9y ago

As someone who's become adept with a few modern statically typed languages (C#, TypeScript, F#), and still sometimes has to write (pull teeth) crufty old Java for Android development, I can tell you that I'm happily pitching into this PR campaign unpaid and of my own volition.

StevePerkins 9y ago

1. Android is the largest mobile platform on the planet. 2. It's been around for a decade now, but has only supported development with Java and C++. 3. The most recent version of Java supported comes from 2011. And full C++ support is only recent. 4. Few people (if any) really like these options. 5. This week Google announced that Kotlin is the next "official" language with first-class support. 6. A temporary wave of stories appear on HN. Are you new here? I'm sure that next week it'll go back to the usual threads about Rust or Haskell, or someone will start a retro fad around Algol-68 or something.

pjmlp 9y ago
What?! C++ might be a 2nd class citizen in SDK tooling, but it is supported since Android 1.5 and C++14 is fully supported. How is that very recent? EDIT: The NDK was actually released with v1.5 (2009), the v2.3 was when STL and exceptions support were added hence my error.
- _pmf_ 9y ago
  Maybe the OP meant using C++ without at least a Application dispatcher/container object written in Java. This has only been possible with the introduction of NativeActivity (which you don't need to derive from, but only refer to via the Manifest).
  - pjmlp 9y ago
    The NativeActivity class was introduced in Android 2.3, released in December 2010, almost 7 years ago!
- krona 9y ago
  Historically the Android platform provided only a very minimal C++ runtime support library, with no RTTI or C++ exceptions.
  - pjmlp 9y ago
    STL and exceptions are available since Android NDK Revision 5, released in December 2010, alongside Android 2.3. https://developer.android.com/ndk/downloads/revision_history.html https://developer.android.com/ndk/downloads/revision_history... How can it be historically, when the features are available since almost 7 years?

rovek 9y ago

News tends to follow current events.

furrydog 9y ago

Kotlin is simply a much more modern option than Java in general, and doubly so for the old version of Java used for Android. Giving Kotlin some official backing gives it a lot of credibility. The big argument favour of using Java over Kotlin until now has been that Kotlin was seen as more of a fringe language than the one (Java) officially endorsed by Google. Now that has changed. As a Scala developer I'm quite happy that Kotlin is getting this much attention as I see it as Scala-lite. I doubt there's a campaign of any sort, just lots of excited developers who are sick of Java and excited about Kotlin.

madiathomas 9y ago

People are just excited. Articles I have seen so far don't sound like PR. People are just excited that they will have an alternative to Java. This is the same kind of an excitement as the one when Apple announced that Swift will be a first class citizen of iOS development. I rarely get excited with programming languages, but this one went straight to my heart. Maybe I am biased because I like JetBrains as a company.

oblio 9y ago

The same thing of thing happens during/immediately after Google I/O, Microsoft Build, Apple WWDC(?), etc. Hype can also occur (somewhat) naturally. It does happen.

giancarlostoro 9y ago

To put it into more perspective, I live in Orlando and Kotlin has been the new growing language for Android since before the announcement. Developers wind up trying Kotlin for themselves and enjoying it for themselves, the rising numbers and the fact Google realized it's popularity and adjusted their support for it shows that Kotlin is a reasonable solution for Android development. It also doesn't help the fact that Java is hostile against Android, and that Kotlin is working on native compilation, which could make it one day one of the most powerful assets of Android if they go full on for native compilation for Android, a benefit that afaik Java doesn't have.

AlexeyBrin 9y ago

You see too much into this. It was the same wave of HN interest when Swift was launched, back in 2014. Or when RubyMotion was announced a few years ago. People are simply excited about being able to use Kotlin as an official alternative to Java on Android. I'm also pretty excited about this ...