Yes but

  val map = GetMap();

does not.

As the programmer, you wouldn't call getMap if you didn't know the return type

As the reader, this situation would be analogous to looking up the what map is, assuming it was declared earlier ... is a datamember etc. something that might as well arise when typing..

     private HashMap<Integer, String> map ;

then 30 lines later

     this.map = getMap();

You would have to check javadocs or function header some time

It does when you can hover your cursor over GetMap() and see the exact specification for it.

Agreed. Once you use a language with type inference it's hard to go back to Java.

Java also lacks properties, which results in boilerplate getter/setters if you want to follow idiomatic convention (you could make all the member variables public, but your coworkers would probably shun you).

There are alternatives. e.g. a public final Property<String> Name = new Property<String>();

Where Property defines a .get() and a .set();

However, getters and setters are generally a code smell. It's better to be telling objects to do things rather than ask them for information. Modern Serialization & Injection frameworks no longer require getters/setters.

You can now do

HashMap<String,ArrayList<String>> map = new HashMap<>();

in Java 7 http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/java/generics/gentype...