Scala Method Notations

Infix Notation/Operator Notation
Method with one parameter can be accessed with space (Natural Language)

class Person {
  def sayHello(name: String) = println(s"Hello $name")
}
val person = new Person
person sayHello "Niranjan"

In scala we can also use +/-/*/#/$ as method names which makes it much more comfortable to code with unlike other languages. This is exactly what is happening in mathematical operators as they are also methods

    println(1 + 3)
    // ALL OPERATORS ARE METHODS in SCALA
    println(1.+(3))

PREFIX NOTATION or Unary Operator
A Unary Operator is also a METHOD in SCALA
All UNARY Operators are methods with prefix “unary_”

val x = -1
// Its same as
val y = 1.unary_-

POSTFIX Notation
Method with no parameter can be accessed without paranthesis

class Person {
  def sayHello = println("Hello")
}
val person = new Person
person.sayHello
// OR
person sayHello

Call By Value vs Call By Name

Call By Value is just like any other programming language where we use the static value of the argument directly

     def calledByValue(x: Long): Unit = {
         println("by value: " + x)
         println("by value: " + x)
     }
     calledByValue(System.nanoTime())

Call By Name
Here instead of the value, the expression is passed as is and it will be evaluated by the compiler everytime. Call by Name is lazily evaluated.

     def calledByName(x: => Long): Unit = {
         // the arrow above is going to tell the compiler to evaluate the parameter by NAME
         // x is evaluated for every use
         println("by name: " + x)
         println("by name: " + x)
     }
     calledByName(System.nanoTime())

Lazy Evaluation example

def infinite(): Int = 1 + infinite()
def printFirst(x: Int, y: => Int) = println(x)

// println(infinite(), 34) // errors with stackoverflow

println(34, infinite()) // runs fine as second parameter is lazily evaluated and is never executed