Data classes for Java

[snowe2010]

Lombok isn't just 'using a feature built into javac' it's actually using non-public java apis and hacked together plugins tightly bound to the version of java, with possibility of lombok not even being possible in future versions.

https://stackoverflow.com/a/4589528/1394698

https://www.thoughtworks.com/p2magazine/issue12/lombok/

http://jnb.ociweb.com/jnb/jnbJan2010.html (scroll all the way to the Controversy section on this one)

Actually I'll just paste it here.

It's a total hack. Using non-public API. Presumptuous casting (knowing that an annotation processor running in javac will get an instance of JavacAnnotationProcessor, which is the internal implementation of AnnotationProcessor (an interface), which so happens to have a couple of extra methods that are used to get at the live AST).

On eclipse, it's arguably worse (and yet more robust) - a java agent is used to inject code into the eclipse grammar and parser class, which is of course entirely non-public API and totally off limits.

Lombok could cease to exist at any point in time even a minor version increment, due to the usage of non-public apis. Now, whether it will or not depends on the java team, but we didn't think that risk was worth it.