Groovy By Example: For Java Programmers

This is based on - http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Groovy-for-Java-Programmers

Groovy is a JVM scripting language, it supports dynamically typed variable, comes with groovyc (interpreter), groovyConsole (small Swing editor). It interoperates with Java seamlessly - can call any Java method and use any Java class. The same holds true for Java - it can call into groovy scripts.

Example 1:
class GroovyPerson {
    // dynamically typed - no semi colons needed.
    def age
    // statically typed
    String name
    
    def printName() {
        println name
    }
    
    static void main(String[] args) {
        // default constructor can accept any number of properties - no getters/setters
        def person = new GroovyPerson(age:7, name: 'Jake')
        person.printName()
    }
}

Example 2:

def cal = Calendar.instance
cal.clear() -- parens required if not passing params to a method
cal.set Calendar.MONTH, Calendar.JULY -- parens optional if passing params to method.
cal.set Calendar.DATE, 4
cal.set Calendar.YEAR, 1776

def time = cal.time

println time

Change 2 to Example 3:
def cal = Calendar.instance
cal.with { -- with() method is added to all classes in java because of groovy to support this usage.
    clear()
    set MONTH, JULY
    set DATE, 4
    set YEAR, 1776
    println time
}

with {} method on an object lets us remove cal. from within the with block.

Everything is Groovy is an object.
Example 4:
result = 10
println result.class

outputs: class java.lang.Integer

   

Example 5:

aString = 'This is a string' -- a regular String is single quoted

answer = 42

aGString = "The answer is $answer" -- a GString (may contain embedded groovy code) is double quoted

Example 6:

message = 'Groovy Is Cool' --- last character in string is -1 index, first is 0 index.

println message[0] //G

println message[-4] // C

println message[0..5] // Groovy

println message[-4..-1] //Cool

println message[-1..-4] // looC -- substrings can be gotten with ranges 

    

Example 7: List
names = ['Watsh', 'Manish', 'Saket']

println names.class -- java.util.ArrayList.
names << 'Rahul' //-- add to the list
println names

Example 8: Maps
myMap = [name:'Watsh', language: 'Groovy']
myMap.town = 'San Ramon' -- put value in map for town key
myMap['company'] = 'Brocade' -- put value in map for company key

println myMap.getClass() -- java.util.LinkedHashMap (default)

   

println myMap.company

Example 9: Class - no getter/setter for properties
class BaseballTeam {
    def city
    def team
    
    def getDisplayName() {
        "$city $team"

    }
}

myTeam = new BaseballTeam(team: 'Bulls', city: 'San Ramon')

println myTeam.team
println myTeam.city
println myTeam.getDisplayName()

Example 10: Closure
myClosure = {
    println "This is closure object $it" -- 'it' is implicit object for a closure.
}
3.times myClosure -- times() method on Integer can take a closure and invoke it n times.

outputs:

This is closure object 0
This is closure object 1
This is closure object 2

Return statement is optional. If no return statement found, the last statement in method is evaluated and returned.

Example 11: More Closure
// passing argument to closure
3.times {firstArg ->
    println "The argument is $firstArg"
}

// using closure to iterate a hashmap
data = [company:'Brocade',
        name: 'Watsh']
        
data.each {key, value -> 
    println "$key is $value"
}