How to implement Builder pattern in Kotlin?

One approach is to do something like the following:

class Car(
  val model: String?,
  val color: String?,
  val type: String?) {

    data class Builder(
      var model: String? = null,
      var color: String? = null,
      var type: String? = null) {

        fun model(model: String) = apply { this.model = model }
        fun color(color: String) = apply { this.color = color }
        fun type(type: String) = apply { this.type = type }
        fun build() = Car(model, color, type)
    }
}

Usage sample:

val car = Car.Builder()
  .model("Ford Focus")
  .color("Black")
  .type("Type")
  .build()

For a simple class you don't need a separate builder. You can make use of optional constructor arguments as Kirill Rakhman described.

If you have more complex class then Kotlin provides a way to create Groovy style Builders/DSL:

Type-Safe Builders

Here is an example:

Github Example - Builder / Assembler

People nowdays should check Kotlin's Type-Safe Builders.

Using said way of object creation will look something like this:

html {
    head {
        title {+"XML encoding with Kotlin"}
    }
    // ...
}

A nice 'in-action' usage example is the vaadin-on-kotlin framework, which utilizes typesafe builders to assemble views and components.

I was working on a Kotlin project that exposed an API consumed by Java clients (which can't take advantage of the Kotlin language constructs). We had to add builders to make them usable in Java, so I created an @Builder annotation: https://github.com/ThinkingLogic/kotlin-builder-annotation - it's basically a replacement for the Lombok @Builder annotation for Kotlin.

I am late to the party. I also encountered the same dilemma if I had to use Builder pattern in the project. Later, after research I have realized it is absolutely unnecessary since Kotlin already provides the named arguments and default arguments.

If you really need to implement, Kirill Rakhman's answer is solid answer on how to implement in most effective way. Another thing you may find it useful is https://www.baeldung.com/kotlin-builder-pattern you can compare and contrast with Java and Kotlin on their implementation

class Foo private constructor(@DrawableRes requiredImageRes: Int, optionalTitle: String?) {

    @DrawableRes
    @get:DrawableRes
    val requiredImageRes: Int

    val optionalTitle: String?

    init {
        this.requiredImageRes = requiredImageRes
        this.requiredImageRes = optionalTitle
    }

    class Builder {

        @DrawableRes
        private var requiredImageRes: Int = -1

        private var optionalTitle: String? = null

        fun requiredImageRes(@DrawableRes imageRes: Int): Builder {
            this.intent = intent
            return this
        } 

        fun optionalTitle(title: String): Builder {
            this.optionalTitle = title
            return this
        }

        fun build(): Foo {
            if(requiredImageRes == -1) {
                throw IllegalStateException("No image res provided")
            }
            return Foo(this.requiredImageRes, this.optionalTitle)
        }

    }

}

I implemented a basic Builder pattern in Kotlin with the follow code:

data class DialogMessage(
        var title: String = "",
        var message: String = ""
) {


    class Builder( context: Context){


        private var context: Context = context
        private var title: String = ""
        private var message: String = ""

        fun title( title : String) = apply { this.title = title }

        fun message( message : String ) = apply { this.message = message  }    

        fun build() = KeyoDialogMessage(
                title,
                message
        )

    }

    private lateinit var  dialog : Dialog

    fun show(){
        this.dialog= Dialog(context)
        .
        .
        .
        dialog.show()

    }

    fun hide(){
        if( this.dialog != null){
            this.dialog.dismiss()
        }
    }
}

And finally

Java:

new DialogMessage.Builder( context )
       .title("Title")
       .message("Message")
       .build()
       .show();

Kotlin:

DialogMessage.Builder( context )
       .title("Title")
       .message("")
       .build()
       .show()

class Person(
    val name:String,
    val family:String,
    val age:Int,
    val nationalCode: String?,
    val email: String?,
    val phoneNumber: String?
) {

    // Private constructor
    private constructor(builder: Builder) : this (
        builder.name,
        builder.family,
        builder.age,
        builder.nationalCode,
        builder.email,
        builder.phoneNumber
    )

    // Builder class

    // 1 Necessary parameters in Builder class : name , family
    class Builder(val name :String,val family :String) {

        // 2 Optional parameters in Builder class :
        var age: Int = 0
            private set
        var nationalCode: String? = null
            private set
        var email: String? = null
            private set
        var phoneNumber: String? = null
            private set

        fun age(age: Int) = apply { this.age = age }
        fun nationalCode(nationalCode: String) =
            apply { this.nationalCode = nationalCode }
        fun email(email: String) = apply { this.email = email }
        fun phoneNumber(phoneNumber: String) =
            apply { this.phoneNumber = phoneNumber }

        // 3 Create
        fun create() = Person(this)

    }
}

for accessing :

val firstPerson = Person.Builder(
    name = "Adnan",
    family = "Abdollah Zaki")
    .age(32)
    .email("Adnan9011@gmail.com")
    .phoneNumber("+989333030XXX")
    .nationalCode("04400XXXXX")
    .create()

val secondPerson = Person.Builder(
    name = "Foroogh",
    family = "Varmazyar")
    .create()

I just found a fun way to create builder in kotlin:

As you can see, moduleBuilder can be reuse for other grafana build.

Here is the code:

class Grafana(
    private val module: String,
    private val scene: String,
    private val action: String,
    private val metric: String
) {
    companion object {
        fun build(module: String, scene: String, action: String, metric: String) =
            Grafana(module, scene, action, metric)

        val builder = ::build.curriedBuilder()

        private fun <P1, P2, P3, P4, R> Function4<P1, P2, P3, P4, R>.curriedBuilder() =
            fun(p1: P1) = fun(p2: P2) = fun(p3: P3) = fun(p4: P4) = this(p1, p2, p3, p4)
    }

    fun report() = Unit
}


val moduleBuilder = Grafana.builder("module")
val scene = moduleBuilder("scene")
val gfA = scene("action")("metric")
gfA.report()

val sceneB = moduleBuilder("sceneB")
val gfB = sceneB("action")("metric")
gfB.report()

val gfC = Grafana.builder("xx")("xxx")("xxxx")("xxxx")
gfC.report()

A little changed and improved version of answers above

class MyDialog {
  private var title: String? = null
  private var content: String? = null
  private var confirmButtonTitle: String? = null
  private var rejectButtonTitle: String? = null

  @DrawableRes
  private var icon: Int? = null


  fun show() {
    // set dialog content here and show at the end
  }

  class Builder {
      private var dialog: MyDialog = MyDialog()

      fun title(title: String) = apply { dialog.title = title }

      fun icon(@DrawableRes icon: Int) = apply { dialog.icon = icon }

      fun content(content: String) = apply { dialog.content = content }

      fun confirmTitle(confirmTitle: String) = apply { dialog.confirmButtonTitle = confirmTitle }

      fun rejectButtonTitle(rejectButtonTitle: String) = apply { dialog.rejectButtonTitle = rejectButtonTitle }

      fun build() = MyDialog()
  }
}

And usage

MyDialog.Builder()
        .title("My Title")
        .content("My content here")
        .icon(R.drawable.bg_edittext)
        .confirmTitle("Accept")
        .rejectButtonTitle("Cancel")
        .build()
        .show()