edit: The text of this post is skippable if you just want to share a general opinion on the subject itself.
Background:
- I went through the Atomic Kotlin exercises a couple years ago when that was still sort of beta, and I loved the language. But I stuck mostly with Python for some reason. Wasn’t feeling adventurous enough yet.
- In college and other ancient times I’ve written some Java and a dozen other languages, but most of those are half-forgotten memories. I don’t have current Java knowledge that I can translate to Kotlin, but I am fluent in general object oriented concepts and data structures, mostly CLI and TUI, but some GUI too. I program daily for fun, but mostly Python.
Problems / Questions:
- Was thinking about trying Kotlin again, but in that old learning module I was hit with Gradle errors after updating IntelliJ to 2021.2, then different Gradle errors after deleting and re-downloading the course (saw there are twice as many exercises now, neat), then a whole mess of new Gradle errors as I fumbled through only vaguely applicable StackExchange suggestions and my own dumb pokery-jiggery. Is Gradle often a headache, or is this rare? I could use some encouragement after this.
- Aside from mobile apps, there’s nothing I want to do that I can’t already do with Python. I still think Kotlin might be such a pleasure to use that it’s worth the effort. But is it? Does it feel elegant and beautiful to you? I mean, do you personally get a lot of pleasure from using this language, or is it for you just a means to an end that’s just slightly better than overly verbose Java?
Interests:
- Playing with math. When I watch a neat math video from channels like Numberphile or 3Blue1Brown, I play with the ideas with code. This is my favorite thing, usually in IntelliJ with the Python plug-in, sometimes Jupyter Notebook, or just vim in the terminal. Kotlin’s compatibility with functional programming could make math stuff fun, too, maybe.
- Possibly creating some Android toys like a base-12 calculator and clock, maybe a base-12 Sudoku, maybe recreating a simple strategy game I made in C++ as a teen, things that aren’t graphics-heavy and that I could probably do with JetPack Compose
- Possibly creating some Linux-server and Android-client things for my home appliances, maybe some Mac clients too
- I’ve made a few little browser-based curiosities that I’d maybe like to translate to Kotlin, like a graphical fence and gate designer that generates carpentry notes
- Phonetic transcription for some hobby writing systems I’ve made, and maybe some other text processing things
- Maybe a sh*tty Zork-style text adventure for my own amusement
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