For what it’s worth from me, I do see the value of a string based query language. The problem is that there are no lexer parser engines out there that understand N1QL except for the ones in Couchbase Server which are written in Go which are unusable in a mobile SDK. We’d basically be starting over on a project that has been in development for 3 years so it would definitely not happen overnight and after that it depends on the demand for it in the end. We’ll have to see what becomes of it. There is nothing in the current SDK or Couchbase Server that will help us except for docs and possibly grammar rules that could be analyzed and applied. NSPredicate does not count because that leaves the other SDK platforms high and dry.
Personally I also find the query builder easy to understand because it is similar to another concept in C# called LINQ and I work on the C# SDK for mobile. It’s just a bit verbose is the thing.