News from January, 2007

The Groovy developer team and myself are proud and delighted to announce the final release of Groovy 1.0.

Groovy is a dynamic language for the JVM that integrates seamlessly with the Java platform.
It offers a Java-like syntax, with language features inspired by Smalltalk, Python or Ruby, and lets your reuse all your Java libraries and protect the investment you made in Java skills, tools or application servers.
Groovy can be used for various purposes, from adhoc shell scripting leveraging Java APIs, to full-blown web applications built on Spring and Hibernate through the Grails web framework.
It can also be integrated very easily in your applications to externalize business logic, create Domain-Specific Languages, or to provide templating capabilities, and much more.

A lot of passion and energy has been put in this new version after two release candidates that have been tested against real-world projects: on a mission-critical insurance application, on the XWiki 2nd generation wiki engine, as well as on the RIFE framework and through the Spring 2.0 scripting integration.

Groovy 1.0's distribution can be downloaded from the usual place:
http://dist.codehaus.org/groovy/distributions/

The JARs should be in Maven's repositories soon, but in the meantime, you can find them here:
http://dist.codehaus.org/groovy/jars/

We hope you will enjoy this release as much as we enjoyed working on it.
Let me thank the whole Groovy team and all the past Groovy committers for their hard work -- too many persons to name everybody!
Big thanks to all our users who have been helping us spot bugs, answer questions on the lists, or contribute documentation and ideas.
It's been a wonderful experience to work with you all to deliver this important milestone of the Groovy project.

On behalf of the whole team, I also seize this opportunity to wish you all the best for this new year.
May 2007 be a groovy year! If you haven't used Groovy yet, make sure that learning Groovy is on your list of resolutions for 2007!
And if that's the case, and you wish to learn Groovy or to dive deeper, you should certainly read "Groovy in Action", the Groovy reference book published by Manning.

--
Guillaume Laforge
Groovy Project Manager

Scott Hickey, the project lead of the Groovy Eclipse plugin has just announced the availability of the plugin which now uses the offcial Groovy 1.0 release. Below you will find the details of the announcement.
A recent article on EclipseZone proposed a Getting Started article explaining the basic usage of the plugin. 

There is a new version of the Groovy Eclipse Plugin available on the update site. For installation instructions, please see the wiki page http://groovy.codehaus.org/Eclipse+Plugin.

This version of the plugin supports Groovy 1.0. Thanks to everybody who made Groovy 1.0 possible.

Please make sure to update the Eclipse project build path for any existing projects to use Groovy 1.0.  For the plugin to function correctly, it is important the version of Groovy used by the plugin and the version included in the build path are the same.

This version of the plugin features:

• Run as Groovy now only shows up on Groovy files that are executable instead of all Groovy files
• Run as Junit is now available for Groovy unit tests, which will display the standard Eclipse Junit view. Run as Groovy for Junit tests will still display inthe console view.
• Run as Groovy and Run as JUnit now create Groovy Launch configurations, which will also show up in the Launch history. This enables the run last launched toolbar button to work.
• Alt-Shift-X-G runs a Groovy file, also creating a Launch Configuration
• Alt-Shift-D-G starts the debugger, also creating a Launch Configuration
• Popup menu on Projects now has options to launch the Groovy Console in a separate window or the Groovy console in the standard Eclipse console. Both are launched with the project classpath.
• Limited code assist, for methods and variables defined in the same file and Default Groovy Methods
• Going forward, plugin updates should be picked up automatically with "Search for updates..." instead of "Search for new features"

The plugin has come a long ways over the last nine months. It wouldn't have been possible without the tremendous effort put forth by Edward Povazan, James Ervin, and David Kerber. Thanks you guys!

Scott

I'm happy to announce that the Groovy in Action book is now
available in the printed version from the Manning site:
http://groovy.canoo.com/gina

Copies are in stock for immediate delivery.
Note that ordering at the publisher's site also includes a
free ebook version.

Booksellers still need some days until they will deliver.

keep groovin'
Dierk

This year started with two important events: the availability of the Groovy in Action book and the final release of Groovy 1.0. Both events will be celebrated with a global release party on January 29th. The idea is to have numerous parties with Groovy enthusiasts all over the planet: Paris, London, Berlin, Munich, Jamaica, Uruguay, and so on. Make sure to find the party near you.

Pictures of this event will be uploaded to flickr with groovyparty tag.

Now the best part. Manning promotes this event with running the following contest:

Send Manning your Groovy photos from Global Groovy 1.0 day and win!
Download a cover image of Groovy in Action, print it out and take it to your party on January 29th.
Photo must show our poster, clearly indicate the location of the party, and have at least 2 people in the photo.

Any person who sends in a photo that fulfills the easy requirements will receive a 40% off coupon good for any Manning title (good for up to $100 purchase).

The top 5 photos (based on some Groovy theme) will get a free Groovy in Action print edition.

Photos must be sent as .jpg files to mkt [at] manning [dot] com. One entry per contestant, one prize per entry. Names and emails must be included with photo submission. Entries must be received by February 5, 2007.

Questions: Visit Manning and look for the Global Groovy 1.0
banner in the right hand column.

So, everybody: don't hesitate to invite your friends organize your party!
Dierk