Andrey Breslav
86 lines
4.4 KiB
Plaintext
86 lines
4.4 KiB
Plaintext
h1. Welcome to [Kotlin] documentation page\!
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*Disclaimer*: this is not a language specification. Neither is it a complete reference manual. These documents are written to give you an impression of what kind of language [Kotlin] is. Some of the examples are somewhat speculative as the implementation of the compiler and library is currently in progress. Most of the details presented here are subject to change. *Your feedback and suggestions are very welcome.* You can write comments or file an issue in the [issue tracker|http://youtrack.jetbrains.net/issues/KT].
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h3. Introductory Video
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For an introduction, check out the presentation [*slides* and *video* from StrangeLoop 2011|http://www.infoq.com/presentations/The-Kotlin-Programming-Language].
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More presentations are available on the [Talks and Publications] page.
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h3. What is [Kotlin]?
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"Project [Kotlin]" is the codename for a *statically-typed JVM-targeted programming language* developed by [*JetBrains*|http://jetbrains.com] and intended *for industrial use*.
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h3. Why a new language?
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At [JetBrains|http://jetbrains.com], we’ve been developing for the *Java* platform for a long time, and we know how good it is. On the other hand, we know that the *Java* programming language has certain limitations and problems that are either impossible or very hard to fix due to backward-compatibility issues. We know that *Java* is going to stand long, but we believe that the community can benefit from a new statically typed JVM-targeted language free of the legacy trouble and having the features so desperately wanted by the developers.
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{anchor:Design goals}
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The main *design goals* behind this project are
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* to create a [*Java-compatible* language|Java interoperability],
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* that *compiles* at least *as fast as Java*,
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* make it *safer* than Java, i.e. statically check for common pitfalls such as [null pointer dereference|Null-safety],
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* make it *more concise* than *Java* by supporting [variable type inference|Basic syntax walk-through#Define a local variable], [higher-order functions|Functions#Higher-order functions] (closures), [extension functions|Extension functions], [code in interfaces and first-class delegation|Classes and Inheritance], etc;
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* and, keeping the useful level of expressiveness (see above), make it as *simple* as possible.
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See more [here|http://blog.jetbrains.com/kotlin/2011/08/02/why-jetbrains-needs-kotlin/].
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h3. What does it look like?
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{jet}
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fun main(args : Array<String>) {
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println("Hello, world!")
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}
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{jet}
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See more [here|Hello, world!] and below.
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h3. Development status
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The compiler is being developed alongside with an [IntelliJ IDEA|http://www.jetbrains.com/idea/] integration.
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[Kotlin] is an [Open Source project|http://github.com/jetbrains/kotlin]. Distributed under Apache 2 License.
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{note:title=Kotlin is Under Development}Please report bugs to our [Issue Tracker|http://youtrack.jetbrains.com/issues/KT]{note}
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If you're interested in keeping track of the project status, you're welcome to subscribe to the [Kotlin blog|http://blog.jetbrains.com/kotlin] or to [follow us on Twitter|http://twitter.com/project_kotlin].
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h3. Read more
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*FAQ*. See [this page|FAQ] for the answers to the most common questions.
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API Documentation for the *Standard Library* can be found [here|http://jetbrains.github.com/kotlin/apidoc/stdlib/].
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API Documentation for the *Runtime* can be found [here|http://jetbrains.github.com/kotlin/versions/snapshot/apidocs/].
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Check out some *[Examples]* to get an idea of what [Kotlin] is:
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* [Hello, world!]
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* [Basic syntax walk-through|Basic syntax walk-through]
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* [Address book] --- collections and higher-order functions
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* [HTML builder|Type-safe Groovy-style builders] --- declarative structures
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* [More...|Examples] --- extensions, pattern matching, IO, operator overloading, etc.
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If you are a *Java* developer, look here:
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* [Comparison to Java], and
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* [Java interoperability]
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If you got interested, take the *Feature tour*:
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* [Modules and Compilation]
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* [Packages]
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* [Functions]
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** [Operator overloading]
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** [Extension functions]
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** [Function literals]
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** [Type-safe Groovy-style builders|Type-safe Groovy-style builders]
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* [Properties And Fields]
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* [Basic types]
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** [Strings]
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* [Expressions]
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{children:page=Expressions|depth=5}
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* [Pattern matching]
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* [Classes and Inheritance]
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{children:page=Classes and inheritance|depth=5}
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* [Generics]
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** [Runtime Type Information]
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* [Null-safety|Null-safety]
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* [Exceptions]
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* [Java interoperability]
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Check out the *[Grammar]* for a formal syntax description. |