4 ms·

How fast is a hello world in node.js to you? I forgot to mention my formerly favorite language: Python. It's _much_ faster than Node.js in startup and relative

by DiThi 9y ago

How fast is a hello world in node.js to you? I forgot to mention my formerly favorite language: Python. It's _much_ faster than Node.js in startup and relatively basic things. Node wins on almost everything I make, though. $ time python test.py # second run hello world real 0m0.009s user 0m0.009s sys 0m0.000s

exikyut 9y ago
Best times from a few "do nothing" runs of Node: $ time node -e '' real 0m0.098s user 0m0.084s sys 0m0.010s Of course on my desktop it's a $ time node -e '' real 0m0.002s user 0m0.000s sys 0m0.000s tiny bit different. Python on my laptop is just slow enough that I really notice it: $ time python -c '' real 0m0.032s user 0m0.022s sys 0m0.009s Of course PHP is all 0.014, 0.010, 0.012, etc. Incidentally, this T43 is a backup machine I'm using while my desktop is on indefinite loan to a family member after their laptop broke. This will be fixed eventually; I'm not sure how. But I've discovered that this old machine is a remarkably good performance catalyst; something that runs blindingly fast on this machine will run really, really well on a faster box - and the thing is, if I write stupid or inefficient code on this older laptop, I'll notice I'm doing it wrong sooner, because it takes less to make this machine fall over from inefficiency. If only I could tell the above to the Chromium team, though... sooo many Chrome issues... (and Firefox is unfortunately slower on old hardware than ever before! >.<)
- DiThi 9y ago
  It seems almost all the time node.js runs hello world is spent loading its own modules. You should try something like this: // watch.js var file = process.argv[2] console.log('press enter to run '+file) process.stdin.on('data', function(){ var [s1,ns1] = process.hrtime() for(var k in require.cache) { delete require.cache[k] } require(file) var [s2,ns2] = process.hrtime() var s = (s2-s1)+(ns2-ns1)*1e-9 console.log('time: ' + s.toFixed(9)) }) Result: less than 1ms on first run $ node watch.js ./test.js press enter to run ./test.js hello world time: 0.000952656 hello world time: 0.000284171 edit: script now deletes all cache, not only the passed script (result is the same if the script doesn't require others)
  - exikyut 9y ago
    Hmm, very interesting. Something to definitely keep in mind, thanks.
- bpicolo 9y ago
  Python is faster on my laptop. time php -r '' real 0m0.064s user 0m0.055s sys 0m0.007s time python -c '' real 0m0.021s user 0m0.011s sys 0m0.005s These startup metrics are also super arbitrary anyway, as in web servers code loading is behind your app server anyway (uwsgi, php-fpm, whatever).
  - exikyut 9y ago
    It's possible "php -nr ''" might be faster; -n stops loading php.ini, which is what points to all of the modules PHP ships with. > These startup metrics are also super arbitrary anyway, as in web servers code loading is behind your app server anyway (uwsgi, php-fpm, whatever). This is true; but only about 1-5% of everything _I_ do (as a hobbyist) faces a webserver, and then the things that do require a webserver are simplistic enough that I can write said webserver in bash and run it from socat.

by DiThi 9y ago

exikyut 9y ago

Best times from a few "do nothing" runs of Node: $ time node -e '' real 0m0.098s user 0m0.084s sys 0m0.010s Of course on my desktop it's a $ time node -e '' real 0m0.002s user 0m0.000s sys 0m0.000s tiny bit different. Python on my laptop is just slow enough that I really notice it: $ time python -c '' real 0m0.032s user 0m0.022s sys 0m0.009s Of course PHP is all 0.014, 0.010, 0.012, etc. Incidentally, this T43 is a backup machine I'm using while my desktop is on indefinite loan to a family member after their laptop broke. This will be fixed eventually; I'm not sure how. But I've discovered that this old machine is a remarkably good performance catalyst; something that runs blindingly fast on this machine will run really, really well on a faster box - and the thing is, if I write stupid or inefficient code on this older laptop, I'll notice I'm doing it wrong sooner, because it takes less to make this machine fall over from inefficiency. If only I could tell the above to the Chromium team, though... sooo many Chrome issues... (and Firefox is unfortunately slower on old hardware than ever before! >.<)

DiThi 9y ago
It seems almost all the time node.js runs hello world is spent loading its own modules. You should try something like this: // watch.js var file = process.argv[2] console.log('press enter to run '+file) process.stdin.on('data', function(){ var [s1,ns1] = process.hrtime() for(var k in require.cache) { delete require.cache[k] } require(file) var [s2,ns2] = process.hrtime() var s = (s2-s1)+(ns2-ns1)*1e-9 console.log('time: ' + s.toFixed(9)) }) Result: less than 1ms on first run $ node watch.js ./test.js press enter to run ./test.js hello world time: 0.000952656 hello world time: 0.000284171 edit: script now deletes all cache, not only the passed script (result is the same if the script doesn't require others)
- exikyut 9y ago
  Hmm, very interesting. Something to definitely keep in mind, thanks.
bpicolo 9y ago
Python is faster on my laptop. time php -r '' real 0m0.064s user 0m0.055s sys 0m0.007s time python -c '' real 0m0.021s user 0m0.011s sys 0m0.005s These startup metrics are also super arbitrary anyway, as in web servers code loading is behind your app server anyway (uwsgi, php-fpm, whatever).
- exikyut 9y ago
  It's possible "php -nr ''" might be faster; -n stops loading php.ini, which is what points to all of the modules PHP ships with. > These startup metrics are also super arbitrary anyway, as in web servers code loading is behind your app server anyway (uwsgi, php-fpm, whatever). This is true; but only about 1-5% of everything _I_ do (as a hobbyist) faces a webserver, and then the things that do require a webserver are simplistic enough that I can write said webserver in bash and run it from socat.