Oakscript does have a certain ring to it

Python is strongly typed, it's just not statically typed. Python with consistent type hinting is extremely similar to a statically typed language like C#.

Sure, and Kotlin is largely syntax sugar for Java. It's certainly nicer, but the semantics are largely the same.

I would argue that without consistent and enforced type hinting, dynamically typed languages offer very little benefit from type-checking at runtime. And with consistent, enforced type hinting, they might as well be considered actual statically typed languages.

Don't get me wrong, that's a good thing. Properly configured Python development environments basically give you both, even if I'm not a fan of the syntax.

You must not write much Kotlin then? It’s far more than sugar when a language fixes core issues in another.

It’s a modern, statically typed language that addresses many of Java’s longstanding limitations with robust type safety, expressive functional features, coroutine-based concurrency, and extensibility — all integrated natively. Interoperability with Java is a strength, not a sign of dependency.

Calling Kotlin merely syntactic sugar is like saying Swift is just Objective-C with prettier syntax — it misses the deep improvements in language design, safety, and developer experience.

I am going to be decapitated for this, but you're totally right.

You only have to look at Rust. An horrible language with a massive hype machine and an army of zealots pushing it everywhere.

I can't understand how people are complaining about the java boiler plate and its verbosity, while promoting Rust every time they can.

Yep, thanks to the AdoptOpenJDK project which really helped make OpenJDK builds available for all platforms. (It is now called Eclipse Temurin and Adoptium.)

For me it's the tooling surrounding it that makes it nice.

You don't think the $500 million marketing budget Sun put towards Java has anything to do with its success? It was more than just luck.

But nobody else does, and I need it more on code I am consuming than producing. In fact, many functions rely on being able to send various types for different behavior. Dynamic programming is crazy to me. It's like guessing. I don't know what type your code is accepting and I have to guess based on the name of read your code directly.

C++ has classes though and if you start with C and then try to go to other Object-oriented languages you’ll be a little lost. But, by learning C++ first, you’re pretty much learning C at the same time, you just need to avoid using classes.

I have the opposite experience, a ton of libraries I use provide optional types, and the handful that don't often have a good reason for it (e.g. numpy). Our projects at work have types almost everywhere, and it's pretty nice to work with.

What's wrong with the syntax? It's just var_name: Type = value, it's very similar to Go or Rust. Things get a little wonky with generics (list[Type] or dict[Type]), but it's still similar to other languages.

One nice thing about it being runtime checked is you can accept union types, def func(param: int | float), which isn't very common in statically typed languages.

I've written a fair amount, enough to know it's a significant improvement on Java, but that it still suffers from the unnecessary abstraction in the standard library. And that's pretty much my main problem with Java.

Swift is a different story because the main issue with Objective C is the syntax.

Yes, that's part of the ecosystem.

This dude came to my spouses work to do some sort of work/help (I don’t know the exact details) and someone wrote a doc he needed to review. It was a lot of work not just like a few notes but a proper doc and all he wrote back upon “reviewing” it was a thumbs up emoji!! everyone was shocked lol, no feed back, no notes nothing just

Try 'Nim'. It is Pythonic language with static typing.

Oracle has nearly nothing to do with Java. OpenSDK is developed by the Apache Foundation.

Rather Dart and Flutter.

Enterprise programming and portable GUI applications.