hey! do you all use some kind of code style formatter for your kotlin projects? We’re looking into i...

# getting-started

[acoconut]

hey! do you all use some kind of code style formatter for your kotlin projects? We’re looking into it and have found the spotless plugin but i really don’t like the way ktfmt formats data classes. I think:

data class Book (
 @Id
 @GeneratedValue(strategy = GenerationType.IDENTITY)
 val id: Long? = null
)

is way easier to read than:

data class Book (
 @Id @GeneratedValue(strategy = GenerationType.IDENTITY) val id: Long? = null
)

What do you all use if anything?

[Richard Gomez]

I agree that the 1st is easier to read. The second makes it harder to read the field definition.

[veluxer]

It is out of point but I think entity class is not suitable for data class. using class is better than data class because entity class use mutable property. data class use immutable property.

also, not nullable ID is better then nullable ID so, I would write code like below.

data class Book (
 @Id
 @GeneratedValue(strategy = GenerationType.IDENTITY)
 val id: Long = 0
)

If you use JPA, id will generate value automatically.

[Richard Gomez]

data class use immutable property.

@veluxer: There's nothing stopping you from using var instead, right?

[veluxer]

It is up to developer. but I wouldn’t if I use data class for VO or DTO

[Michael Böiers]

This is sufficient for me. Activating the inspection for the formatting is quite useful. https://kotlinlang.org/docs/code-style-migration-guide.html

[acoconut]

Thanks Michael!

And also veluxer, thanks, I will do some reading on this 🙂

[Colton Idle]

Seems like ktfmt or ktlint is what most people use. ktlint has a lot of flexibility but I hit issues with it all the time to work consistently. ktfmt works really well, but I can't really customize it.

Personally I prefer, 0 customization and consistent code.

[Colton Idle]

In a lot of other cases ktfmt works way better than ktlint IMO

[Colton Idle]

See #ktlint and #ktfmt for more. 😅