Why Groovy Berlin GUG March 2018

**** WARNING ****
The answers to the Groovy Truth or Myth questions have been removed. Please don't spoil it for future attendees.

Groovy has been around for a long time, but over the last several years, Groovy has changed a lot. Some of the articles, blog posts, and talks published about early versions of Groovy are just no longer true. By the end of this session, you’ll be able to tell some of the best Groovy truth from fiction and leave with some solid arguments for your boss and others as to why Groovy is such an awesome, productive, and readable alternative language for the JVM.

We'll start with some of the community’s favorite features like special operators, optional typing, metaprogramming, and dynamic vs. static compilation. We’ll also explore popular libraries and frameworks where knowing Groovy would be helpful such as Gradle build files, Elasticsearch, Jenkins, and Apache Spark. The session concludes with ways to learn more and how to contribute to making Groovy even more groovy.

Transcript

1. Why use #groovylang? How to
   convince your boss and others
   Jenn Strater
   @codeJENNerator
   

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2. @codeJENNerator
   Note For Those Viewing
   Slides Online
   • Bulleted text like this indicates the key points
   mentioned on a previous slide. They may not have
   been included in the official presentation.
   • If this view does not support links, the links will work
   in the pdf. Click the ‘download pdf’ button on the
   right.
   

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3. @codeJENNerator
   Follow Along
   https://speakerdeck.com/jlstrater/why-groovy-berlin-gug-march-2018
   

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4. @codeJENNerator
   Outline
   • Why use Groovy?
   • Truth or Myth?
   • Ways to Start Using Groovy Today!
   

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5. Unless otherwise indicated, these slides are © 2013-2016 Pivotal Software, Inc. and licensed under a Creative Commons
   Attribution-NonCommercial license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/
   Follow Along
   https://speakerdeck.com/jlstrater/test-driven-docs-springone-2017
   https://github.com/jlstrater/groovy-spring-boot-restdocs-example
   https://github.com/ratpack/example-books
   https://github.com/jlstrater/spring-restdocs-public-api-example
   5
   

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6. @codeJENNerator
   About Me
   - Working at Zenjob.
   
   - Groovy (mostly Grails) user since 2013.
   
   - Before moving to Berlin, I spent a year in Copenhagen.
   
   - Before that, I was senior consultant at Object Partners, Inc. in
   Minneapolis, MN, USA.
   
   - Co-founder of Gr8Ladies (deprecated)
   
   - Passionate about bring new people into the Groovy community through
   free introductory workshops called Gr8Workshops and supporting
   underrepresented minorities and their careers in tech.
   

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7. @codeJENNerator
   Audience Background
   

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8. @codeJENNerator
   Audience Background
   • Groovy
   • Everyday user
   • Side project user
   • New to Groovy
   • Frameworks / Tools
   • Grails
   • Spock
   • Gradle
   • Griffon
   • Jenkins
   • Spring Boot
   

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11. @codeJENNerator
    Features
    

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    Ecosystem
    

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25. @codeJENNerator
    Community
    

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28. @codeJENNerator
    

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29. @codeJENNerator
    Truth
    or Myth?
    

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30. @codeJENNerator
    • After spending some time at Java User Groups,
    Conferences, and reading lots of stuff online, I
    realized that there are a lot of things people get
    wrong about Groovy or that just aren’t true in the
    most recent versions.
    • All of these assumptions are things are related to
    conversations I’ve had with real people at some
    point in my career.
    

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31. @codeJENNerator
    WARNING
    • For the online version, the answers have been
    removed. You’ll just have to see it in person next
    time ;)
    

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32. @codeJENNerator
    1.Groovy is the same
    thing as Grails
    

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33. @codeJENNerator
    2. Groovy is a
    scripting language
    

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34. @codeJENNerator
    3. The original creator of
    Groovy has left the
    community
    

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35. @codeJENNerator
    4. Groovy’s dynamic
    nature can mean more
    runtime errors
    

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36. @codeJENNerator
    5. Groovy is a dynamically
    typed language
    

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37. @codeJENNerator
    6. Groovy is for side projects/
    scripts/internal projects but
    not for production apps
    

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38. @codeJENNerator
    7. Groovy is slow
    

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39. @codeJENNerator
    8. Gradle is switching to
    Kotlin because Groovy
    sucks.
    

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    9. You can use Groovy
    and still write statically
    compiled code
    

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41. @codeJENNerator
    10. Grails is Rails for
    the JVM
    

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    11. Groovy is dead
    

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45. @codeJENNerator
    Adding Groovy to your
    organization
    

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46. @codeJENNerator
    See if you are already using Groovy in/
    with your existing libraries or frameworks
    • Jenkins (Pipeline, Jobs Plugin, and many more!)
    • Spring Boot (optional Groovy support)
    • Apache Spark
    • SoapUI
    • JMeter
    • Tinkerpop
    • Elasticsearch (deprecated)
    

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47. @codeJENNerator
    Spock
    • Groovy can be used in tests, but not in the end
    product if you don’t need it.
    • Spock is the BEST testing framework for the JVM
    

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48. @codeJENNerator
    Try a small POC
    • Frameworks like Grails are great for trying
    something out. If the team gets used to using
    Groovy for small projects, it might be easier to use it
    in more places later.
    

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49. @codeJENNerator
    Get Connected
    • Subscribe to the groovy users mailing list
    • Join the Groovy Community on Slack
    groovycommunity.com or sign-in again at groovy-
    community.slack.com
    • Contribute by writing documentation or fixing bugs.
    • Attend conferences like GR8Conf EU 2018.
    • Join Zenjob!
    

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50. @codeJENNerator
    Conclusion
    

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51. @codeJENNerator
    

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52. @codeJENNerator
    • Groovy is a fun language with a great community!
    

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53. @codeJENNerator
    • Groovy is a fun language with a great community!
    • You can use Groovy in many different ways!
    

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54. @codeJENNerator
    • Groovy is a fun language with a great community!
    • You can use Groovy in many different ways!
    • It isn’t an all-or-nothing solution. You can start small.
    

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55. @codeJENNerator
    • Groovy is a fun language with a great community!
    • You can use Groovy in many different ways!
    • It isn’t an all-or-nothing solution. You can start small.
    • Start talking about Groovy with your boss and
    coworkers and make sure they don’t keep
    spreading the Groovy myths. Keep them on the
    Groovy truth.
    

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56. @codeJENNerator
    Questions?
    https://flic.kr/p/5DeuzB
    

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