3 ms·

Performant is a perfectly valid word which has been part of software engineering since at least the 1990s. "... aiming to provide performant tools ..." (1995)

by dalke 10y ago

Performant is a perfectly valid word which has been part of software engineering since at least the 1990s. "... aiming to provide performant tools ..." (1995) - https://books.google.com/books?id=uZjYdk4bQgkC&pg=PA1&dq=performant&hl=en&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=performant&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=uZjYdk4bQgkC&pg=PA1&dq=per... definitions for different aspects of 'peformant' (1998) - https://books.google.se/books?id=FYkmwYKBoCwC&pg=PA235&dq=%22performant%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=CG4XVIydJ4XUiwKM1IDQBg&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=%22performant%22&f=false https://books.google.se/books?id=FYkmwYKBoCwC&pg=PA235&dq=%2... "The network and hierarchical data models, introduced in the 1960's, provide a very performant data organization for well-defined, update-intensive transaction processing of large volumes of data at the cost of conceptual complexity" (1993) - https://books.google.com/books?id=Ro3zjjTNE9UC&pg=PA327&dq=performant&hl=en&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=Ro3zjjTNE9UC&pg=PA327&dq=p... Here's the n-grams trend. https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=performant&year_start=1800&year_end=2010&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cperformant%3B%2Cc0 https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=performant&yea... . There are many domain-specific terms which have not yet made it to general dictionaries. For example, from your comments, I see you used the word 'multicast', This is not in Merriam-Webster, at http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/suggestions/multicast http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/suggestions/multic... . What makes it a word but not performant? Is "zero-copy" a word? "smarthost"? "type-punning"? "upstream"?

saynsedit 10y ago
Those example words have precise meaning, "performant" does not. Engineers should communicate using precise language, like other technical disciplines.
- userbinator 10y ago
  I think that's what bugs me about "performant" --- it feels like vague buzzwordy management-speak, because there's already a well-understood word for the same concept: "fast". Ditto for "lightweight"; "small" gets the point across clearly, and if it's both fast and small, it's "efficient". Software can be big or small, fast or slow, efficient or inefficient (for combinations of size and speed.) I don't think we need any more adjectives beyond those. Instead of "significantly less performant", you could just say "much slower". (Note that LOOP was much slower on older Intel CPUs, but was the same as the longer sequence on AMD's. It would not surprise me if newer Intel ones now decode LOOP into the same sequence of uops. In any case, unless the loop is a tiny one, what happens in the body is likely to make a much more significant difference, especially if cache misses are involved.) Some interesting reading on why LOOP was slower on Intel CPUs --- because Windows 95's timing loop used it (observe the lack of "performant" in any of those posts): https://groups.google.com/d/topic/alt.windows98/liuMAIctHRg https://groups.google.com/d/topic/alt.windows98/liuMAIctHRg
  - dalke 10y ago
    But do you think it's not a word? Also, I think performant is often used as a synonym for "fast enough", which is slightly different than "fast."
- dalke 10y ago
  What's imprecise about: "Performant: 1) meeting the objective, often applied to a performance objective, 2) productive"? In looking around just now, economics seems to prefer the second definition, which is why I added it. All of the uses I found are compatible with this definition. What's the definition of "object oriented" again?
- galdosdi 10y ago
  A vague word is useful when you are trying to convey a vague concept, in much the same way as it would be hard to convey the idea that you know that some metric is between 20% and 40%, if you are not allowed to be vague and are required to arbitrarily pick some number like 38.51% and say that one instead

by dalke 10y ago

saynsedit 10y ago

Those example words have precise meaning, "performant" does not. Engineers should communicate using precise language, like other technical disciplines.

userbinator 10y ago
I think that's what bugs me about "performant" --- it feels like vague buzzwordy management-speak, because there's already a well-understood word for the same concept: "fast". Ditto for "lightweight"; "small" gets the point across clearly, and if it's both fast and small, it's "efficient". Software can be big or small, fast or slow, efficient or inefficient (for combinations of size and speed.) I don't think we need any more adjectives beyond those. Instead of "significantly less performant", you could just say "much slower". (Note that LOOP was much slower on older Intel CPUs, but was the same as the longer sequence on AMD's. It would not surprise me if newer Intel ones now decode LOOP into the same sequence of uops. In any case, unless the loop is a tiny one, what happens in the body is likely to make a much more significant difference, especially if cache misses are involved.) Some interesting reading on why LOOP was slower on Intel CPUs --- because Windows 95's timing loop used it (observe the lack of "performant" in any of those posts): https://groups.google.com/d/topic/alt.windows98/liuMAIctHRg https://groups.google.com/d/topic/alt.windows98/liuMAIctHRg
- dalke 10y ago
  But do you think it's not a word? Also, I think performant is often used as a synonym for "fast enough", which is slightly different than "fast."
dalke 10y ago
What's imprecise about: "Performant: 1) meeting the objective, often applied to a performance objective, 2) productive"? In looking around just now, economics seems to prefer the second definition, which is why I added it. All of the uses I found are compatible with this definition. What's the definition of "object oriented" again?
galdosdi 10y ago
A vague word is useful when you are trying to convey a vague concept, in much the same way as it would be hard to convey the idea that you know that some metric is between 20% and 40%, if you are not allowed to be vague and are required to arbitrarily pick some number like 38.51% and say that one instead