Book Image

Mastering Kotlin

By : Nate Ebel
Book Image

Mastering Kotlin

By: Nate Ebel

Overview of this book

Using Kotlin without taking advantage of its power and interoperability is like owning a sports car and never taking it out of the garage. While documentation and introductory resources can help you learn the basics of Kotlin, the fact that it’s a new language means that there are limited learning resources and code bases available in comparison to Java and other established languages. This Kotlin book will show you how to leverage software designs and concepts that have made Java the most dominant enterprise programming language. You’ll understand how Kotlin is a modern approach to object-oriented programming (OOP). This book will take you through the vast array of features that Kotlin provides over other languages. These features include seamless interoperability with Java, efficient syntax, built-in functional programming constructs, and support for creating your own DSL. Finally, you will gain an understanding of implementing practical design patterns and best practices to help you master the Kotlin language. By the end of the book, you'll have obtained an advanced understanding of Kotlin in order to be able to build production-grade applications.
Table of Contents (25 chapters)
Free Chapter
1
Section 1: Kotlin – A Modern Solution to Application Development
4
Section 2: Putting the Pieces Together – Modeling Data, Managing State, and Application Architecture
8
Section 3: Play Nice – Integrating Kotlin With Existing Code
13
Section 4: Go Beyond – Exploring Advanced and Experimental Language Features
17
Section 5: The Wide World of Kotlin – Using Kotlin across the Entire Development Stack

Chapter 11: Building Your Own Tools – Domain-Specific Languages (DSLs)

  1. What does DSL stand for?
  • Domain-Specific Language
  1. Can you name two examples of domains to which DSLs can be applied?
  • Building web pages
  • Defining static layouts
  • Testing
  1. What are the two primary building blocks of a DSL in Kotlin?
  • Extension functions
  • Higher-order functions
  1. What are two mechanisms for controlling the scope of a DSL function?
  • Functions with a receiver
  • @DslMarker annotations
  1. What is the @DslMarker annotation used for?
  • It controls which receivers a lambda has access to by default so that a lambda only has access to the current receiver if annotated.
  1. What are two benefits that custom DSLs can provide?
  • They provide a very human-readable API for common tasks.
  • They can simplify the construction or representation of an artifact (such as a web page) using the declarative syntax...