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> Since the article goes out of its way to not mention Kotlin, "Since the article goes out of its way to not mention [Rust|Kotlin]" and "I'm surprised this art

> Since the article goes out of its way to not mention Kotlin, "Since the article goes out of its way to not mention [Rust|Kotlin]" and "I'm surprised this article has no mention of [Rust|Kotlin]" must be one of the most frequently used templates on HN.

jillesvangurp 6y ago
The difference is that Kotlin has been gobbling up Java users using Java frameworks like Android and Spring. Coroutines are used in both and implement structured concurrency exactly like Loom does. It's not a little bit similarish and vaguely related: it maps 1 to 1 conceptually; well at least for the stuff that Loom actually implements. Rust indeed would deserve a mention as well but it follows a somewhat different approach to the same problem. But Kotlin is somewhat special here as Oracle is bleeding users to specifically Kotlin.
- ragnese 6y ago
  I think that Kotlin's existence has really given Java a kick in the pants. I agree that there has been a lot of people picking up Kotlin because of how verbose and "last century" programming in Java feels. Modern (static typed, imperative, algol-like) languages are so much more ergonomic (Rust, Go, Kotlin, Swift, TypeScript, etc), that it's kind of painful to go back to Java, with its silly "everything has to be an object, except we still have unboxed primitives for some reason", etc. On the other hand, to their credit, the Java devs (Oracle, I guess) have really stepped up their game in response. Java just (fucking finally) got "records" (better than data classes, IMO), and sealed classes. Soon they'll have virtual threads. And some day they may actually have what I think they call "value types" (bad name), which will be excellent news. With these things, they've implemented basically all of Kotlin's "must have" features except for null safety and clean, sexy, syntax. If they ever tack on some kind of "strict null mode" to Java, that might just be the end of Kotlin. Everyone who wants a functional JVM language will go to either Scala or Clojure, and the rest can stay on Java. That is, unless of course, the Kotlin guys pull more tricks out of their sleeves. But, in all reality, the entire purpose of Kotlin seems to have been to have a middle-ground between Java and Scala while learning from the mistakes of both. If those languages also learn from their own mistakes (they are), then Kotlin is in trouble.
  - pron 6y ago
    Kotlin was created circa 2010 as a result of Java's stagnation in Sun's dying days. Oracle has since increased investment in the platform. So Java's resurgence and Kotlin's appearance are both a response to the same event rather than one causing the other.
  - vips7L 6y ago
    > ergonomic (Rust, Go, Kotlin, Swift, TypeScript, etc), that it's kind of painful to go back to Java. I really don't know how you can include Go here. It's extremely unergonomic to manually write for loops, and to deal with pointers and references.
    - ragnese 6y ago
      That's true. And honestly, I don't personally like Go. I included it out of respect. :) But the whole static duck typing thing is really nice and much less awkward than Java-style interfaces, IMO.
- pjmlp 6y ago
  Kotlin is just yet another guest language on the JVM, written in a mix of Java, C++, no Kotlin code around, neither today nor tomorrow. Google is pushing Kotlin as hard as they can on Android, while leaving Android Java dialect stagnate on a pseudo Java 8 compatibility, they have a political agenda to play here. Spring just goes after any shiny thingie that might bring users into their domain, Groovy, Clojure, Scala, and now Kotlin.

jillesvangurp 6y ago

The difference is that Kotlin has been gobbling up Java users using Java frameworks like Android and Spring. Coroutines are used in both and implement structured concurrency exactly like Loom does. It's not a little bit similarish and vaguely related: it maps 1 to 1 conceptually; well at least for the stuff that Loom actually implements. Rust indeed would deserve a mention as well but it follows a somewhat different approach to the same problem. But Kotlin is somewhat special here as Oracle is bleeding users to specifically Kotlin.

ragnese 6y ago
I think that Kotlin's existence has really given Java a kick in the pants. I agree that there has been a lot of people picking up Kotlin because of how verbose and "last century" programming in Java feels. Modern (static typed, imperative, algol-like) languages are so much more ergonomic (Rust, Go, Kotlin, Swift, TypeScript, etc), that it's kind of painful to go back to Java, with its silly "everything has to be an object, except we still have unboxed primitives for some reason", etc. On the other hand, to their credit, the Java devs (Oracle, I guess) have really stepped up their game in response. Java just (fucking finally) got "records" (better than data classes, IMO), and sealed classes. Soon they'll have virtual threads. And some day they may actually have what I think they call "value types" (bad name), which will be excellent news. With these things, they've implemented basically all of Kotlin's "must have" features except for null safety and clean, sexy, syntax. If they ever tack on some kind of "strict null mode" to Java, that might just be the end of Kotlin. Everyone who wants a functional JVM language will go to either Scala or Clojure, and the rest can stay on Java. That is, unless of course, the Kotlin guys pull more tricks out of their sleeves. But, in all reality, the entire purpose of Kotlin seems to have been to have a middle-ground between Java and Scala while learning from the mistakes of both. If those languages also learn from their own mistakes (they are), then Kotlin is in trouble.
- pron 6y ago
  Kotlin was created circa 2010 as a result of Java's stagnation in Sun's dying days. Oracle has since increased investment in the platform. So Java's resurgence and Kotlin's appearance are both a response to the same event rather than one causing the other.
- vips7L 6y ago
  > ergonomic (Rust, Go, Kotlin, Swift, TypeScript, etc), that it's kind of painful to go back to Java. I really don't know how you can include Go here. It's extremely unergonomic to manually write for loops, and to deal with pointers and references.
  - ragnese 6y ago
    That's true. And honestly, I don't personally like Go. I included it out of respect. :) But the whole static duck typing thing is really nice and much less awkward than Java-style interfaces, IMO.
pjmlp 6y ago
Kotlin is just yet another guest language on the JVM, written in a mix of Java, C++, no Kotlin code around, neither today nor tomorrow. Google is pushing Kotlin as hard as they can on Android, while leaving Android Java dialect stagnate on a pseudo Java 8 compatibility, they have a political agenda to play here. Spring just goes after any shiny thingie that might bring users into their domain, Groovy, Clojure, Scala, and now Kotlin.