Structured Data Parsing. Managing and Transforming Information Using Kotlin - David Vance

Master the Core of Modern Backend Engineering with Kotlin

In today's interconnected software landscape, data is constantly in motion. Whether you are building high-speed APIs, consuming massive flat files, or designing enterprise data pipelines, understanding how to handle structured information is a non-negotiable skill.

Structured Data Parsing: Managing and Transforming Information Using Kotlin is your definitive guide to reading, interpreting, and reshaping data safely and reliably. Written for both transitioning frontend developers and experienced backend engineers, this book provides a deep dive into the mechanics of data exchange using the modern, expressive power of Kotlin.

What You Will Learn:

JSON Mastery: Automate data mapping with kotlinx.serialization, Jackson, and Gson while handling missing fields and polymorphic payloads safely.

Enterprise XML: Navigate tree-based DOM models and highly efficient StAX streaming to process gigabytes of XML data without crashing your servers.

Flat File Processing: Safely ingest massive CSV files using Kotlin sequences and lazy evaluation to keep memory footprints completely flat.

Configuration Formats: Implement self-validating data classes for YAML and TOML to ensure your applications fail fast on misconfigurations.

Resilient Data Pipelines: Chain parsing, semantic validation, and transformation into seamless, non-blocking asynchronous streams using Kotlin Coroutines and Flows.

Error Handling at Scale: Design robust dead-letter queues and implement exponential backoff for unpredictable network APIs.

Why This Book?

Moving beyond simple syntax tutorials, this guide focuses on architectural resilience. You will learn to recognize critical anti-patterns, enforce strict schema contracts, and separate your Data Transfer Objects from pure domain models. Through highly practical, real-world scenarios, you will build the confidence to tackle any corrupted payload or massive dataset.

Equip yourself with the tools to build exceptional software. Turn the unpredictable wilderness of raw data into clean, strongly typed Kotlin objects, and scale your backend systems with unshakeable stability.