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"JavaScript, if used diligently and with good design, is a very efficient language. Both in execution time, but more importantly for developers. Personally, I

by xupybd 10y ago

"JavaScript, if used diligently and with good design, is a very efficient language. Both in execution time, but more importantly for developers. Personally, I wrote apps in many languages, including C++, Java and JavaScript. Of those, JavaScript is by far the most productive - I am personally 4-10 times as productive as with C++." Not trying to start a this language is better flame war, but is this true? I still find JS to be a strange and incomplete feeling language, but I've not really done much outside of front end work with it. Is it really that productive? Also I've disliked every interaction with NPM. You end up with a huge chain of decencies for even simple applications. Is this something that's workable with production software?

wise0wl 10y ago
I work for a company that uses mostly Node.js for their production microservices. It works very well. Joyent wrote their entire private / public cloud in Node.js. https://github.com/joyent/ https://github.com/joyent/ It is definitely production workable. It's "LTS" cycle is insane, but it's workable.
beagle3 10y ago
I suspect it is true that among Java, C++ and JavaScript, disciplined well designed JavaScript is easier for developers, and reasonably efficient in execution (given e.g. v8). Especially compared to C++, the memory safety and speed of the compile->run->debug cycle tend to give JavaScript an edge for more programmers (x4 to x10 is of course subjective). But that doesn't mean JavaScript is a good language. e.g., you have to be extremely careful to not get bitten by the floating point-only math. It was the source of catastrophic bugs for many Twitter clients (in the sense that they stopped working) -- I would hate to find such a bug ate my local mail store. Not sure what I'd recommend, though - JavaScript is technically bad, but socially excellent for such a project. Python is not fast enough for it (PyPy not withstanding), D/Rust/Nim/Ocaml/Scala are not mainstream enough.

by xupybd 10y ago

wise0wl 10y ago

I work for a company that uses mostly Node.js for their production microservices. It works very well. Joyent wrote their entire private / public cloud in Node.js. https://github.com/joyent/ https://github.com/joyent/ It is definitely production workable. It's "LTS" cycle is insane, but it's workable.

beagle3 10y ago

I suspect it is true that among Java, C++ and JavaScript, disciplined well designed JavaScript is easier for developers, and reasonably efficient in execution (given e.g. v8). Especially compared to C++, the memory safety and speed of the compile->run->debug cycle tend to give JavaScript an edge for more programmers (x4 to x10 is of course subjective). But that doesn't mean JavaScript is a good language. e.g., you have to be extremely careful to not get bitten by the floating point-only math. It was the source of catastrophic bugs for many Twitter clients (in the sense that they stopped working) -- I would hate to find such a bug ate my local mail store. Not sure what I'd recommend, though - JavaScript is technically bad, but socially excellent for such a project. Python is not fast enough for it (PyPy not withstanding), D/Rust/Nim/Ocaml/Scala are not mainstream enough.