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In the embedded world, the default language is still C by a wide margin. You have to argue hard to have C++ considered and languages like Rust&Go just aren't on
by TickleSteve 10y ago
In the embedded world, the default language is still C by a wide margin. You have to argue hard to have C++ considered and languages like Rust&Go just aren't on the radar.
Only in HN world is C considered legacy. For the rest of the world, its the well-known workhorse of the software world.
- dagw 10y agoFor the rest of the world, its the well-known workhorse of the software world. But it's a workhorse that's continually being replaced. I'm not talking about Rust&Go. I'm talking about C++/Java/C#. Thinking about C projects I saw 15-20 years ago, hardly any of them would be written in C if they where started today. And even in the embedded world C++ is becoming more and more of a thing. Is C used, of course. Is C going away, of course not. Is C "used as much as ever", I just don't see it.
- TickleSteve 10y agoThe number of devices with embedded software is growing all the time. These devices are 99% of the time using C. ...therefore the number of C projects is growing, not shrinking.
- kbart 10y agoI can confirm that. I write C for embedded systems every day, but for better or worse, I don't see any replacement for it in foreseeable future. C++, Python, Java etc. might be used at higher levels (GUI, for example), but all the guts are still good, old, plain C. Rust is still in its infancy so it's hard to tell and even if it succeed, it will be evolution, not revolution and will take decades to replace C fully. HN is a bit of echo chamber as mostly SaaS, web and other high level application developers are here. For them C might be dead as well, but if you have anything to do with hardware and system programming, C is still the tool.