Updated June 12, 2023
Difference between Groovy and Java
Groovy is an object-oriented programming language to develop applications on Java Platform where its syntax is Java compatible and is being maintained by Apache Projects. Its features are similar to those of the programming languages such as Python, Perl, Ruby, and Smalltalk. Java is an Object-Oriented Programming. It is a general-purpose programming language that is class-based and having concurrent programming features. It has multi-threading features too. It is intended to develop applications that can be Written Once and Run Anywhere.
Groovy
Groovy was developed by Jochen Theodorou, Guillaume Laforge, Cedric Champeau, and Paul King. Its typing discipline is strong, static and dynamic. It was licensed under the Apache 2.0 license. It first appeared in the year 2003. Its file extension is .groovy and was designed by James Strachan.
Java
James Gosling designed Java. It was developed and is maintained by Oracle Corporation (then Sun Corporation). It is a static, safe and strongly typed programming language. Its’ file extension names are .java or .class. It first appeared in the year 1995. It is most popular for the client-server kind of application. It is licensed under GNU General Public License and Java Community Process. The latest version of Java is 10, which is released in March 2018.
Head To Head Comparison Between Groovy and Java (Infographics)
Below is the top 9 difference between Groovy and Java
Key Differences Between Groovy and Java
Both are popular choices in the market; let us discuss some of the major difference:
- Groovy is a programming language and also supports scripting language, whereas Java is an object-oriented programming language.
- Groovy supports multi-methods where the choice of running the method will be chosen at the time of runtime, whereas Java provides multiple declarations of methods by choosing them at the time of compilation rather than run time.
- In Groovy, the Automatic Resource Management mechanism is not available and static, anonymous inner classes, whereas Java provides automatic resource management from Java 7 version and has the upper hand in terms of inner static classes or anonymous classes.
- In Groovy, there are functional programming features such as Lambda functions; functional interfaces, whereas Java has Lambda functions, functional interfaces, and much other streaming and parallel operations functions available from its JDK version 8 onwards.
- In Groovy, String and character literals can be defined and declared using single or double quote format, whereas Java has only double quote format to declare and define a string literal or character literal.
- In Groovy, everything is an Object and uses only Objects. Hence, there is no concept of autoboxing or unboxing and no conversion of primitives. In contrast, Java has primitive data types and Wrapper classes to perform autoboxing and auto-unboxing, either explicitly or implicitly.
- In Groovy, the automatic widening and narrowing of data types have a lot of wide scope with many conversions, whereas Java has limitations in narrowing or widening the data types.
- Groovy has a default access modifier as public for all its kind of class members or data, whereas Java has default access level as package level depending on the class members type.
- Groovy generates the getters and setter automatically in its class to access and modify the members of the class, whereas, in Java, they have to be explicitly mentioned in the class with access modifiers.
- Groovy has Groovy beans, whereas Java has Java beans.
- Groovy is also called a superset of Java as the Java programs can be run on a Groovy environment.
- Groovy has simpler syntax in defining the types by using simply def to declare a variable, whereas Java has different types of type names to be used to declare the variable or any methods or members of the class.
- Groovy does not require any main method or entry point of a method to run the class or any program, whereas Java has a requirement of the main method inside a class to run the program.
Groovy vs Java Comparison Table
As you can see, there are many Comparison between Groovy vs Java. Let’s look at the top Comparison between Groovy vs Java –
| The basis of comparison |
Groovy |
Java |
| Definition | It is compiled to JVM bytecode and is compatible with the Java Platform. | It is developed on JDK and is run on JVM. |
| Usage | It is used when as both programming language and scripting language. | It is used as a programming and object-oriented language. |
| Integration | It can be integrated along with any web applications and scripting applications. | It can also be integrated with any object-oriented application as it is compatible with any JVM based applications. |
| Platform | It supports any operating systems or platforms | It supports cross-platform operating systems |
| Syntax | The syntax is very similar to Java syntax. | It has a strong disciple in its syntax. |
| Community | It has been submitted to JCP for specification request. | It has a larger community called the Java Community process, i.es, JCP, being maintained by a large group of highly qualified technical experts across the industry. |
| License | It was licensed under Apache license 2.0 | It was licensed under GNU General Public License. |
| Imports | All the packages will be imported by default. | It has to be mentioned clearly to import any package into the java class file. |
| Documentation | It provides single page documentation. | It has documentation in the form specification given by JCP. |
Conclusion
Groovy vs Java both are object-oriented programming languages, whereas Groovy support scripting language as well. The requirement in scripting language along with programming language gives weight to the Groovy. The choice of the programming language depends on the functionalities and features as required to make the application work efficiently by making the trade-off choice in an effective manner.
Java is mostly used. Recently, Java allows in providing an environment to run the JavaScript or scripting languages in its JRE environment in JDK 9.0 version onwards by providing a Nashorn JavaScript Engine. So Java can be considered for any kind of application requirement in the case of larger applications that need faster development scope and easier to develop complex services or applications where the case of optimization, messaging features and many other efficient techniques are available in the Java Enterprise environment.
Recommended Articles
This has been a guide to the top difference between Groovy vs Java. Here we also discuss the key differences with infographics and comparison table. You may also have a look at the following articles to learn more.
