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How to document attributes in Kotlin data class?


Where shall I put Javadoc analogy for attributes in KDoc in Kotlin data class?

In other words, how to write in Kotlin KDoc the following Java code Javadoc:

/**
 * Represents a person.
 */
public class Person {
    /**
     * First name. -- where to place this documentation in Kotlin?
     */
    private final String firstName;
    /**
     * Last name. -- where to place this documentation in Kotlin?
     */
    private final String lastName;

    // a lot of boilerplate Java code - getters, equals, hashCode, ...
}

In Kotlin it looks like this:

/**
 * Represents a person.
 */
data class Person(val firstName: String, val lastName: String)

but where to put the attributes' documentation?


Solution

  • As described in the documentation, you can use the @property tag for this:

    /**
     * Represents a person.
     * @property firstName The first name.
     * @property lastName The last name.
     */
    data class Person(val firstName: String, val lastName: String)
    

    Alternatively, simply mention the property names in the description of the class, if you don't have much to say about them in the docs:

    /**
     * Represents a person, with the given [firstName] and [lastName].
     */
    data class Person(val firstName: String, val lastName: String)