In the world of computer science, we have a bunch of programming languages that serve different and unique features. Among these languages, Kotlin and Groovy are both programming languages that run on Java Virtual Machine (JVM) offering compatibility with existing Java code bases.
While both languages share common ground, they have distinct use cases, distinct philosophies, and distinct features that cover different project scenarios and requirements. In this article, we will have a deep look into key features, benefits, strengths, and weaknesses that will help you to make a decision for choosing the language that suits best your scenarios.
What Is Kotlin?
Kotlin is a modern programming language developed by JetBrains, It was first introduced in 2011 as an alternative to Java, targeting the Java Virtual Machine (JVM). It was initially launched to be used as a plugin in Android Studio. Later in May 2017 Kotlin was declared as the official Android Development language. It is the third language that fully supports Android development after Java and C++. The goal behind introducing Kotlin was to address various lacking features in existing programming languages, particularly Java while maintaining seamless interoperability with Java.
Nowadays Kotlin has become most popular among developers and its community has increased in a large scale.
Key Features of Kotlin:
After talking about how the journey of Kotlin was started, now we will look into key features of kotlin that attract developers towards it.
- Concise code and readability: Kotlin is known for its concise syntax that helps developers to reduce boilerplate code. This makes code very easy to understand and more readable.
- Null Safety: One of the very popular and powerful features of Kotlin is its Null Safety feature, that distinguishes nullable and non-nullable types.This feature helps developers to prevent null pointer exceptions which is a very common issue in programming languages.
- Interoperable with Java: Kotlin is fully interoperable with Java, allowing developers to use existing Java libraries and frameworks seamlessly. This interoperability makes it easy to adopt Kotlin in projects with an existing Java codebase.
- Large scale audience adoption: Continue contributions of developers to its plugin and library making its community large and srong.Kotlin’s ecosystem has grown significantly in recent years.
- Coroutines support: To manage asynchronous tasks in a very easy and effective manner Kotlin comes up with the most powerful feature – Coroutines. Coroutine comes up with suspend functions which allow developers to pause and resume background processes.
- Statically-Typed Language: Statically typed means type of declared variable is known at compile time. This feature helps to catch errors early in the development process and saves developers time.
Advantages of Kotlin:
- In the form of extension functions, Kotlin allows developers to add new methods in existing classes without modifications in those classes.
- Apart from Android developers, back-end developers are also moving towards Kotlin due to its features like null safety and conciseness.
- Kotlin came up with Coroutines, which has made asynchronous programming more easy and readable compared to traditional callback based approach.
Applications of Kotlin:
- Android App development and Back-end Development: For Android development Kotlin is the preferred choice for developers, It is also suitable for server side development that can help to build web applications, micro services, and other back end services.
- Cross Platform Development: With Kotlin Multiplatform, developers can use kotlin to build applications that run on multiple platforms like iOS(iOS development).
What Is Groovy?
Groovy is a dynamic object-oriented programming language for Java platform that is distributed through the Apache License v 2.0 and also runs on Java Virtual Machine(JVM). Like Kotlin, Groovy also supports seamless Java integration that allows developers to take advantage of existing java libraries and frameworks. Groovy can be used as both a programming language and a scripting language for the Java Platform.
Groovy is very similar to Java language in terms of syntax so it is very easy to learn, especially for Java developers. It also supports markup languages like XML and HTML
Key Features of Groovy:
After having a close look at Kotlin key features, now it’s time to look into key features of Groovy.
- Dynamic Typed language: In contrast with Kotlin, Groovy is dynamic typed language that allows variables to change their type runtime.
- Optional dynamic Typed language: Along with dynamic type Groovy also supports optional static typing. Developers can use annotations if they want to add some level of static typing.
- Scripting Language Features: More often Groovy is used as a scripting language due to its support of concise syntax and scripting features.
- Clouser supporting language: Similar to the lambda and functions in Kotlin, Groovy supports Clouser which makes it more concise and readable.
- Domain-Specific language(DSL) Support: Groovy is also well known for its ability to create Domain-Specific Languages(DSL). Expressive syntax of Groovy allows developers to design custom language that are mainly tailored to the specific domains.
- Association with Grails Framework: Groovy has strong association with Grails web application framework. Grails is specifically built on the top of Groovy and provides a convention-over-configuration approach that makes web application development more simple.
- Interoperable with Java: Like Kotlin, Groovy is also designed to be fully interoperable with Java. Groovy code can seamlessly call java code and java code can seamlessly call Groovy code. This feature makes it very easy to introduce Groovy into existing Java projects.
Advantages of Groovy:
- Groovy’s metaprogramming capabilities makes it well suitable for creating Domain Specific Language that can help with configuration.
- Groovy’s association with Grails makes web development more simple.
Applications of Groovy:
- Build Tools(Gradle): Gradle is a very popular tool for automation tools(using Groovy). Developers often use Groovy script for defining build configurations.
- Testing: Groovy’s easy syntax and scripting capability makes it good choice for writing test cases.
- Scripting and Automation: Groovy is widely used for scripting and automations due to its concise and dynamic features.
Kotlin VS Groovy
Lets look at key differences between both language by considering several aspects like usage, compilation, IDE support etc.
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|
Kotlin |
Groovy |
|---|---|---|
|
Purpose |
The primary purpose of Kotlin is to be a Static typed programming language with concise syntax. |
The Groovy is to be a dynamic typed programming language with concise and expressive syntax. |
|
Usage |
Kotlin is the official language for Android app development. After Java Kotlin is the second largest language that is being used for Android application development. |
Groovy is used mostly for scripting tasks and Domain-Specific language. If your project contains a significant amount of scripting then Groovy is the best choice. |
|
Null Safety |
Kotlin ensures null safety by using appropriate operators. |
Groovy does not provide such a feature. |
|
Compilation |
To overcome redundancy and boilerplate code Kotlin was developed as a Static typed language. Compile time checks results in performance optimization. |
Groovy comes with advantages of supporting Static and Dynamic types. Setting type as dynamic is applicable by default while for defining it static needs to define annotation @ CompileStatic |
|
IDE supports |
Kotlin provides excellent integration with InteliJ IDEA. Android Studio is the most commonly used IDE for Android application development. |
Groovy does not have dedicated IDE support as Kotlin but popular IDEs like InteliJ IDEAand Eclipse gives support to Groovy. |
|
Java Interoperability |
Kotlin provides seamless integration with Java. Kotlin code can work with Java code and vice versa. |
Like Kotlin, Groovy is also fully interoperable with Java.Integration of Groovy code to existing Java projects is also easy. |
|
Example |
Print “Hello World”: fun mian(){ |
Print “Hello World”: Class HelloWorld{ |
|
Code comparison |
// Kotlin example code snippet for creating Employee class fun main() { val emp = Employee(name = “Rahul Dravid”, salary = 25000) // Accessing properties of the person println(“Name:${emp.name}”) } |
// Groovy example code snippet for creating Employee class def emp = new Employee(name: “Rahul Dravid”, salary: 25000) // Accessing properties of the employee println(“Name: ${emp.name}”) println(“Age: ${emp.salary}”) |
Use Cases
Choosing right language for development depends on its actual requirement, after having look at key feature and difference of Kotlin and Groovy now we will have look around some use cases which fits best for these languages.
Kotlin
- Android Development – Being declared as official Android Language, Android is preferred programming language for Android Development offering modern features and concise syntax.
- General-Purpose programming – Apart from Android development kotlin is also suitable for web development and server side programming.
Groovy
- Scripting task: Groovy is the best available programming language for scripting tasks due to its concise and expressive syntax. For Android projects Groovy is widely used language for defining dependency and writing task in build.gradle file
- DSL Creation: For creating Domain specific language also Groovy is preferred language due to its conductive syntax.
Conclusion
Kotlin and Groovy both are powerful languages with their strengths and use cases. Kotlin is a statically typed language that is mostly used for Android development and General purpose programming. While Groovy is Dynamic typed language mostly used for DSL and Scripting tasks.The choice between these two depends on projects needs, preferences of the development team, Final decision should align with project’s goal and should meet all project requirements.
