# Groovy Weekly #42

> Groovy Weekly #42 delivers the latest on Grails 2.4.4, Geb 0.10, Reactor 2.0.0.M1, the Spock Notebook, and essential ecosystem updates.

Author: [Guillaume Laforge](https://glaforge.dev/) | Published: 2014-10-28 | Topics: groovy, groovy-weekly | Canonical: https://glaforge.dev/posts/2014/10/28/groovy-weekly-42/


Isn’t it a mythical number? The 42nd edition of Groovy Weekly! Will we get the answer to life the universe and everything?

At least, we have a nice list of releases, this week, in particular with Grails 2.4.4, Geb 0.10 and the first milestone of Reactor 2.0!

And if there’s one thing I’d like to highlight in addition, that would be MrHaki’s release of his new book, the Spock Notebook, with all those nice recipes about our preferred testing framework.

## Releases

*   [Grails 2.4.4](https://twitter.com/grailsframework/status/527119729631461376) released with bug fixes and improvements
*   [Geb 0.10](https://twitter.com/tomaslin/status/524798100041261058) released
*   [Reactor 2.0.0.M1](https://spring.io/blog/2014/10/21/reactor-2-0-0-m1-released-with-reactive-streams-integration) released
*   [Groovy Android Gradle plugin 0.3.2](https://twitter.com/cedricchampeau/status/526687506323238912) released fixing joint compilation issues
*   [JMH Gradle plugin 0.1.3](https://twitter.com/cedricchampeau/status/527031406124609536) released
*   [Gretty 1.1.5](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/gradle-dev/dpQkogqx_bw) is out
    
## Articles

*   Roberto Guerra writes about [Ratpack handlers and Groovy chains](http://blog.stumblingoncode.com/posts/2014-10-20-ratpack-groovy-chain.html)

## Presentations

*   Hans Dockter on [Gradle and the road ahead](https://thenewcircle.com/s/post/1673/gradle_and_the_road_ahead_hans_dockter_video), recorded at SF Java in June 2014
*   Cédric Champeau presented [Groovy on Android](https://twitter.com/cedricchampeau/status/525608597863268353), with a sample application using Google Wear, at SoftShake 2014
*   Danny Hyun [presented Ratpack](https://twitter.com/Lspacewalker/status/524763500674310144) (slides and code included)
*   Guillaume Laforge gave his "[What makes Groovy groovy](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8E3TdP_KIJo)" through Google Hangout at the Barcelona JUG
*   Iván López presented "[Metaprogramming with Groovy](https://twitter.com/ilopmar/status/525549799638966273)" at GeeCON and offers links to his slides and code samples
*   More recordings of Trisha Gee's [AngularJS / HTML5 / Groovy / Java / MongoDB](http://trishagee.github.io/presentation/angularjs_html5_groovy_java_mongodb_wcpgw/) talk

## Screencasts

*   Cédric Champeau recorded this video showing a [Google Wear application built with Groovy](https://vine.co/v/Ob2Z1dZrAFt), that he demonstrated at the Soft Shake 2014 conference

## News

*   Andrés Almiray repackages the huge [Google Material Design icon as JARs that you can reuse](https://github.com/aalmiray/google-materialdesignicons) in your web / desktop / mobile projects
*   Jacob Aae Mikkelsen published the [Grails Diary week 43](http://grydeske.net/news/show/67)

## Google+

*   A new [CodinGame contest supporting Groovy](https://plus.google.com/u/0/105332504458974739532/posts/L6edmMmQ6JR?cfem=1) is happening soon

## Tweets

*   Meet [Gradle expert Peter Niederwieser in Stockholm](https://twitter.com/gradleware/status/524843728511320064)
*   Use [Grails' --non-interactive flag for easier Continuous Integration](https://twitter.com/dailygrailstip/status/524964020478939136)
*   A week into Groovy and Grails, and Yosi Pramajaya [celebrates Groovy and Grails' awesomeness](https://twitter.com/yosipramajaya/status/525469302594347008)!
*   Jorge Martín is looking into [adding some Groovy-ness to some Android APIs](https://twitter.com/arasthel92/status/525914957599088640)
*   Cédric Champeau wishes there were as many [contributions to the Groovy documentation](https://twitter.com/CedricChampeau/status/525010686951579648) as there are edits on the Groovy entry on Wikipedia
*   Dierk König remarks a [programming language popularity tanking where Groovy ranks 8th](https://twitter.com/mittie/status/526137634671034368)
*   [GPars makes concurrency on Groovy not suck](https://twitter.com/Bl_nK_/status/525081570424532992)
*   Burt Beckwith shares the link to a [tracker analyzing changes between Grails versions](https://twitter.com/burtbeckwith/status/526440858217111553)
*   [Grails 2.4.4](https://twitter.com/gvmtool/status/527126880714252288) available on GVM
*   Dierk König's been [programming in Groovy for 10 years](https://twitter.com/mittie/status/527115100654956544) and is still amazed
*   After 10 years of Groovy, Dierk König notes that [Java finally has high-order functions](https://twitter.com/mittie/status/527129202588680193)

## Code snippets

*   Cédric Champeau published the code of his [Google Wear Android application written in Groovy](https://twitter.com/cedricchampeau/status/525608882253877248)
*   Dierk König presents a [null-safe monad in Groovy](https://gist.github.com/Dierk/358a2bf24cdcd10044e8) with Java 8 function
*   Stéphane Maldini shared a snippet showing a [send & receive RabbitMQ flow with Reactor's AMQP](https://gist.github.com/smaldini/d6858b08773e028f5383) support
    
## Books

*   MrHaki published the [Spock Notebook](http://mrhaki.blogspot.fr/2014/10/spocklight-notebook-is-published.html)

## Events

*   The [Greach conference is looking for sponsors](https://twitter.com/greachconf/status/525582247387480064)! If you or your company is willing to help, don't hesitate to get in touch with the Greach crew!