Effective Scala (SoftShake 2013)

Effective
Scala
SoftShake 2013, Geneva

Mirco Dotta
twitter: @mircodotta

Golden rule?

imple!
P IT S
KEE

is not because you
It
, that you should
can

What’s this talk about?
mize your use of
Opti
Scala to solve real
world problems
thout explosions,
wi
broken thumbs or
bullet wounds

Agenda
•Style matters
•Mantras
•Collection-foo
•Implicits

Learn the Scala way
You know it when you got it
Scala ain’t Java
nor Ruby
nor Haskell
nor <INSERT known PL>

http://docs.scala-lang.org/style/

Abstract members
trait Shape {
val edges: Int
}

Why?

class Triangle extends Shape {
override def edges: Int = 3
}

Because this
doesn’t

compile!

Abstract members
Always use def for abstract
members!
trait Shape {
def edges: Int
}

You’ve to override
trait Worker {
def run(): Unit
}
abstract class MyWorker
extends Worker {
override def run(): Unit =
//...
}

Don’t leak your types!
trait Logger {
def log(m: String): Unit
}
object Logger {
class StdLogger extends Logger {
override def log(m: String): Unit =
println(m)
}
def apply = new StdLogger()
}

What’s the return type here?

Hide your secrets
object SauceFactory {
def makeSecretSauce(): Sauce = {
val ingredients = getMagicIngredients()
val formula = getSecretFormula()
SauceMaker.prepare(ingredients, formula)
}

te! getMagicIngredients():
riva
p def

Ingredients = //...
def getSecretFormula(): Formula = //...
}

Visibility modifiers
• Scala has very expressive visibility
modifiers

•

Access modifiers can be augmented with qualifiers

Did you know that...
public

(default)

package

protected

private

private

nested packages have access
to private classes

•

Companion object/classes
have access to each other
private members!

private[pkg]

protected

•

everything you have in java, and much more

Don’t blow the stack!
IF YOU THINK IT’S
tailrecursive, SAY so!

case class Node(value: Int, edges: List[Node])
def bfs(node: Node, pred: Node => Boolean): Option[Node] = {
@scala.annotation.tailrec
def search(acc: List[Node]): Option[Node] = acc match {
case Nil => None
case x :: xs =>
if (pred(x)) Some(x)
else search(xs ::: xs.edges)
}
search(List(node))
}

String interpolation
case class Complex(real: Int, im: Int) {
override def toString: String =
real + " + " + im + "i"
}

case class Complex(real: Int, im: Int) {
override def toString: String =
s"$real + ${im}i"
}

interpolator!

Write Expressions,
not Statements

Expressions!
• shorter
• simpler
• Composable!

def home(): HttpPage = {
var page: HttpPage = null
try page = prepareHttpPage()
catch {
case _: TimeoutEx => page = TimeoutPage
case _: Exception => page = NoPage
}
return page
}

def home(): HttpPage =
try prepareHttpPage()
catch {
case _: TimeoutEx => TimeoutPage
case _: Exception => NoPage
}

Expressions compose!
catch {
}

Try..catch is
an expression

This is a PartialFunction[Throwable,HttpPage]

def timeoutCatch = {
}
def noPageCatch = {
}

catch timeoutCatch orElse
noPageCatch

mp
co

e!
os

null is a disease
• nullcheks will spread
• code is brittle
• NPE will still happen
• assertions won’t help

Forget null, use Option
• no more “it may be null”
• type-safe
• documentation

def authenticate(session: HttpSession,
username: Option[String],
password: Option[String]) =
for {
user <- username
pass <- password
if canAuthenticate(user,pass)
privileges <- privilegesFor(user)
} yield inject(session, privileges)

But don’t overuse Option
sometime a null-object can be
a much better fit
catch {
}

Null Object!

Immutability
3 reasons why it matters?

• Simplifies reasoning
• simplifies reasoning
• simplifies reasoning

Immutability
Allows co/contra variance
ity
bil
uta ce
m
ian --var ---+
------- bles
rou
T

Jav
a

String[] a = {""};
Object[] b = a;
b[0] = 1;
String value = a[0];
rrayStoreException
java.lang.A

Immutability
• correct equals & hashcode!
• it also simplifies reasoning
about concurrency

• thread-safe by design

Immutability
• Mutability is still ok, but
keep it in local scopes

• api methods should return
immutable objects

Do you want faster Scala compilation?

program to an interface, not
an implementation.

Collection-foo

Collection-foo

http://www.scala-lang.org/docu/ﬁles/collections-api/collections.html

Learn the API
!=, ##, ++, ++:, +:, /:, /:, :+, ::, :::, :, <init>, ==, addString, aggregate,
andThen, apply, applyOrElse, asInstanceOf, canEqual, collect, collectFirst,
combinations, companion, compose, contains, containsSlice, copyToArray,
copyToBuffer, corresponds, count, diff, distinct, drop, dropRight, dropWhile,
endsWith, eq, equals, exists, filter, filterNot, find, flatMap, flatten, fold,
foldLeft, foldRight, forall, foreach, genericBuilder, getClass, groupBy, grouped,
hasDefiniteSize, hashCode, head, headOption, indexOf, indexOfSlice, indexWhere,
indices, init, inits, intersect, isDefinedAt, isEmpty, isInstanceOf,
isTraversableAgain, iterator, last, lastIndexOf, lastIndexOfSlice, lastIndexWhere,
lastOption, length, lengthCompare, lift, map, mapConserve, max, maxBy, min, minBy,
mkString, ne, nonEmpty, notify, notifyAll, orElse, padTo, par, partition, patch,
permutations, prefixLength, product, productArity, productElement, productIterator,
productPrefix, reduce, reduceLeft, reduceLeftOption, reduceOption, reduceRight,
reduceRightOption, removeDuplicates, repr, reverse, reverseIterator, reverseMap,
reverse_:::, runWith, sameElements, scan, scanLeft, scanRight, segmentLength, seq,
size, slice, sliding, sortBy, sortWith, sorted, span, splitAt, startsWith,
stringPrefix, sum, synchronized, tail, tails, take, takeRight, takeWhile, to,
toArray, toBuffer, toIndexedSeq, toIterable, toIterator, toList, toMap, toSeq,
toSet, toStream, toString, toTraversable, toVector, transpose, union, unzip,
unzip3, updated, view, wait, withFilter, zip, zipAll, zipWithIndex

Know when to breakOut
def adultFriends(p: Person): Array[Person] = {
val adults = // <- of type List
for { friend <- p.friends // <- of type List
if friend.age >= 18 } yield friend
adults.toArray
}

can we avoid the 2nd iteration?
def adultFriends(p: Person): Array[Person] =
(for { friend <- p.friends
if friend.age >= 18
} yield friend)(collection.breakOut)

Common pitfall
def getUsers: Seq[User]

mutable or immutable?

Good question!
remedy

import scala.collection.immutable
def getUsers: immutable.Seq[User]

Implicit Resolution
• implicits in the local scope
•
•
•

Implicits defined in current scope (1)

•
•
•

companion object of the type (and inherited types)

explicit imports (2)
wildcard imports (3)

• parts of A type
companion objects of type arguments of the type
outer objects for nested types
http://www.scala-lang.org/docu/ﬁles/ScalaReference.pdf

Implicit Scope (Parts)
trait Logger {
def log(m: String): Unit
}
object Logger {
implicit object StdLogger extends Logger {
override def log(m: String): Unit = println(m)
}
def log(m: String)(implicit l: Logger) = l.log(m)
}

Logger.log("Hello")

Level up!
Scala In Depth

Joshua Suereth

http://www.manning.com/suereth/

Effective
Scala
Thanks to @heathermiller for the presentation style
Mirco Dotta
twitter: @mircodotta

Effective Scala (SoftShake 2013)

More Related Content

What's hot (20)

Viewers also liked (20)

Similar to Effective Scala (SoftShake 2013) (20)

More from mircodotta (7)

Recently uploaded (20)

Effective Scala (SoftShake 2013)