Deprecate and hide @Nullable, @NonNull annotations to avoid name clashes with jspecify

[vlsi]

Currently, org.jetbrains.kotlin:kotlin-stdlib:2.2.21 depends on org.jetbrains:annotations, so it brings org.jetbrains.annotations.Nullable to IDE autocomplete.

The ecosystem moves towards https://jspecify.dev/, so it would be nice if you could deprecate and hide @Nullable and @NonNull annotations.

Deprecation is straightforward: @Deprecated + release announcement.
Hiding would probably involve adding ACC_SYNTHETIC modifier after the compilation. It would still keep the class in the bytecode, so the old libraries would still work fine in the runtime, while the new clients would need to move to a different nullability annotations.
An alternative option could be to rewrite @Nullable annotation in Kotlin and use @Deprecated(level = HIDDEN)

[amaembo]

The problem with Kotlin will not be solved with this: they depend on veeery old version of IntelliJ annotations and so far refuse to change this. In fact they should not expose this dependency at all.

[vlsi]

In fact they should not expose this dependency at all.

That is fair. Here's the issue: https://youtrack.jetbrains.com/issue/KT-49803/Consider-not-exporting-dependency-on-org.jetbrainsannotations-from-kotlin-stdlib

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However, org.jetbrains:annotations has great use besides nullability (e.g. @Nls, @Language), so projects might still use org.jetbrains:annotations for a good reason.

WDYT of hiding nullability in the long run?

[amaembo]

We may consider this, but now it's too early. Meanwhile, you can exclude a particular item from completion options if you are using IntelliJ IDEA. Just press Alt+Enter when it's suggested.

[vlsi]

Yeah, adding project-level codeInsightSettings.xml as follows would likely help, however, it will be IDEA-specific config

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<project version="4">
  <component name="JavaProjectCodeInsightSettings">
    <excluded-names>
      <name>org.jetbrains.annotations.NotNull</name>
      <name>org.jetbrains.annotations.NotNullByDefault</name>
      <name>org.jetbrains.annotations.Nullable</name>
      <name>org.jetbrains.annotations.UnknownNullability</name>
    </excluded-names>
  </component>
</project>

[vlsi]

BTW: could you please clarify why is it too early to deprecate org.jetbrains.annotations.Nullable?
I was about to create the similar requests to com.github.spotbugs:spotbugs-annotations, and probably com.google.code.findbugs:jsr305 (they have their own variations)

[sunkyung048-cloud]

Currently, org.jetbrains.kotlin:kotlin-stdlib:2.2.21 depends on org.jetbrains:annotations, so it brings org.jetbrains.annotations.Nullable to IDE autocomplete.

The ecosystem moves towards https://jspecify.dev/, so it would be nice if you could deprecate and hide @Nullable and @NonNull annotations.

Deprecation is straightforward: @Deprecated + release announcement. Hiding would probably involve adding ACC_SYNTHETIC modifier after the compilation. It would still keep the class in the bytecode, so the old libraries would still work fine in the runtime, while the new clients would need to move to a different nullability annotations. An alternative option could be to rewrite @Nullable annotation in Kotlin and use @Deprecated(level = HIDDEN)