Just one import to access Javaslang

With Javaslang 2.0.0 we introduced javaslang.API, the best way to use language-level constructs like the pattern matching API and for-comprehensions.

import static javaslang.API.*;

class Example {
    String stringify(int n) {
        return Match(n).of(
            Case(0, "zero"),
            Case(1, "one"),
            Case($(i -> i > 1), "many"),
            Case($(), "negative")
        );
    }
}

Starting with 2.1.0 we will have more API methods. These give us access to nearly all Javaslang types. Here are some examples:

// instead of System.out.println
println("Finally!");

// instead of using null (TODO will throw NotImplementedError)
String html = TODO("load http://javaslang.io");

// instead of Tuple.of(1, "Hello")
Tuple(1, "Hello")

// same as HashMap.ofEntries(Tuple.of(1, "one"), Tuple.of(2, "two"))
Map(1, "one", 2, "two");

// instead of List.of(1, 2, 3)
List(1, 2, 3);

// instead of Option.some(1) and Option.none()
Some(1);
None();

*) Creating Maps will be safe, we removed the Map.of(Object...) method.

The only thing we have to do is adding one import:

import static javaslang.API.*;

---

Just a thought...

Wouldn't it be great if we were able to automatically have this import either in the scope of a package or if it could be defined as project default?

We could use the existing package-info.java or module-info.java files to define package-scoped or global imports. Of course javac would need to take these import statements into account.

Example:

File package-info.java:

/**
 * Javaslang can be used throughout this package
 * without the need to explicitly import it.
 */
package w00t;

import static javaslang.API.*;

File Test.java:

package w00t;

interface Test {
    static void main(String[] args) {
        println(Vector(args).mkString(", "));
    }
}

But for now we still need to import javaslang.API in our classes...

Have fun!

- Daniel