The recordings of our 1.5.0 release celebration event are out and available for you on the Kotlin YouTube Channel. Subscribe to the channel updates and stay up to date with the Kotlin future events!
Recordings and slidesÂ
Our amazing hosts â Svetlana Isakova and Sebastien Aigner â gave a talk about the 1.5.0 updates, and Roman Elizarov presented on the future of Kotlin. After that, members of the JetBrains Kotlin team and guests from Google and VMware answered questions from the attendees.Â
Check out the recordings:
- Kotlin 1.5.0 Highlights, the talk by Svetlana Isakova and Sebastian Aigner
- Future Plans for Kotlin, the talk by Roman Elizarov
- Q&A with the Kotlin team
And slides of the talks.Â
If you would like to learn more about the Kotlin 1.5.0 release, please check out these materials:
- Release blog post: Kotlin 1.5.0 â the First Big Release of 2021
- YouTube playlist with video highlights of the main updates in 1.5.0
Q&A and âAsk Me Anythingâ session with the Kotlin team
We were thrilled to receive so many questions from you â 630 questions before the event and 150 more during the live stream! Thank you everyone who asked questions! Itâs encouraging to see so much interest and engagement from the community!  Â
A one-hour Q&A session wasnât enough to cover all of them â thatâs why a day after the event, we caught up during an Ask Me Anything session on Reddit. Please check out the Kotlin 1.5 Online Event thread. Join the r/Kotlin subreddit for news and notifications about future AMA sessions.Â
The 10 most interesting questions from the event
We picked the 10 most interesting questions, and the winners will receive special Kotlin 1.5 T-shirts. The questions cover details about Kotlin updates, best practices, and important topics for future plans. You can check out the answers below and even jump into the discussions on Reddit!Â
Question #1:
Do you think large monolith Kotlin projects will also get a performance boost in future versions?
âOf course! Our new front-end is doing exactly that â speeding up the compilation of a single module. So if youâre stuck with one big module and canât use Gradle, for example, in parallel, then the new front-end should make you happy.â Proceed to the full discussion on Reddit.
Question #2:
Whatâs the team vision on compiler plugins in the long run?
âCurrent compiler plugin API mostly was created as ad-hoc solutions for the needs of kotlinx plugins (like kotlinx.serialization). We plan to properly design it when the new compiler becomes stableâ. Read the full answer on RedditÂ
Question #3:
Are there plans to support WebAssembly in Jetpack Compose for Web?
âIt might be a bit early to say just yet, but Iâd personally love to see it! If you have a particular reason why youâd be excited about the combination of WebAssembly and Compose, weâd also be interested to hear it! :)â Post your suggestions on Reddit.
Question #4:
Any news on the Kotlin Native garbage collector rewrite?
âWhile weâre on the topic, Iâd like to clarify something. You might hear about Kotlin/Nativeâs new garbage collector, or a new memory manager, or a new memory model. Itâs mostly all the same! The garbage collector is a part of the memory manager. Often these terms are used interchangeably.
Now to the news!
Weâve settled on starting with a simple stop-the-work, mark and sweep GC, and are considering evolving it later to a concurrent mark and sweep GC.â Read the full answer on Reddit and our recent blog post âKotlin/Native Memory Management Updateâ
Question #5:
With Java adopting many features that Kotlin has or had, how will Kotlin stand out against Java after JDK17 is released?
âThe key features of Kotlin, like its null-safety, equal treatment of val/var, concise and modern design, extensibility, and DSL-friendliness are nowhere to be found in Javaâs roadmap. These still make programming in Kotlin safe, fun, and enjoyable. This is even without taking into account that Kotlin evolves and never stands still.â Read more on Reddit
Question #6:
What is the ultimate goal of Kotlin? Is it something like âWrite in one language, used in everywhereâ? (I thought this because of Kotlin Multiplatform, KMM, Compose for Web, Desktop, etc.)
âIn short, yes. We are striving to create a general-purpose application development language, well-suited for all kinds of applications in different domains and working on different platforms.â Answer on Reddit
Question #7:
Have you already tried Project Loom in Coroutines implementation?
âWe keep checking it, but we donât know if it will be in the final API. At the moment weâre waiting for Loom to graduate at least to the preview stage.â Full answer from the online event
Question #8:
As a tech lead with experience of leading a real world project with KMM, itâs harder to get iOS developers to accept this stack. This would be easier with AppCode integration, so you have such plans to support the iOS developer experience further?
âThe experience for iOS developers was always a pretty noticeable pain point there, but recently weâve seen that itâs getting more and more traction (weâd like to think that itâs because weâre removing other, more apparent roadblocks, but who knows :D)â Read more on Reddit
Question #9:
Are (or will be) there any tools to access compiler and analyzer api for external usage? The only way now is using Kotlin compiler source code itself.
âYes. I think at some point we will create a separate additional jar file with the public compiler API.â Read the full discussion on Reddit
Question #10:
Why main() isnât use in Android development?
âEven though Android shares a lot of the underlying components (such as the Linux kernel) and concepts (such as processes) with traditional operating systems, it has a very different model for running user applications. This is because it operates on a different set of constraints, such as limited battery capacity, and expectations, especially when it comes to security and privacy of user data. This leads to a stronger sandbox model and affects how users interact with their devices throughout the day.â Read more on Reddit
More helpful links and materialsÂ
Find more questions and discussions under the Kotlin Team AMA #3 post. Thanks again to everyone for your active participation in the Q&A!Â
Check out other release materials:
- Kotlin official YouTube channel. Subscribe for more events and video content.
- Release blog post: Kotlin 1.5.0 â the First Big Release of 2021
- Kotlin 1.5.0 whatâs new page
- YouTube playlist with video-highlights of the main updates in 1.5.0
- Our Reddit community. Join it for Kotlin news and future AMA sessions with the Kotlin team.