Could someone please explain what it the key diffe...

# announcements

[Anthony Styzhin]

Could someone please explain what it the key difference between these two options of the same function?
fun findShort(s: String): Int = s.split(" ").minBy { it.length }!!.count()
vs
fun findShort(s: String): Int = s.split(" ").minBy { it.length }!!.length

Both options work, pass unit tests and both are presented among solutions at codewars. Just trying to satisfy my curiosity ^^
Thanks in advance!

[karelpeeters]

Both count and length are on String here, so everything else is not relevant. Then count is defined here: https://github.com/JetBrains/kotlin/blob/master/libraries/stdlib/common/src/generated/_Strings.kt#L946-L952
So they're exactly the same.

[Burkhard]

Damn, I just looked up the exact same link.

[Anthony Styzhin]

Thanks a lot. So in case of a string there’s no difference in something like one is O(n) and the other O(1)?

[karelpeeters]

No.

[Burkhard]

My guess the count function is just there to be more similar to Collection (might actually be Iterable). It also has count and length, but in this case I think length calls count and not the other way round.

[karelpeeters]

No for collection count returns size which is part of the Collection interface. Iterable also has count but that is O(n).

[Burkhard]

Woops your right, either way, length and count are the same for all classes/interfaces in the standard library (unless someone can point me to an exception).

[John]

@kotlin.internal.InlineOnly
public inline fun CharSequence.count(): Int {
    return length
}

[karelpeeters]

Yes, that's the link I posted.