3 ms·

HHVM 4.0.0

32 points by marksamman 8y ago

johnmaguire2013 8y ago
> With this release, we no longer aim to be compatible with PHP. Looks like a big release! I'm curious -- is anyone actually using HHVM, either in production or for personal use?
- chrisseaton 8y ago
  > is anyone actually using HHVM Aren't Facebook using it?
  - johnmaguire2013 8y ago
    Besides Facebook...
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
- Gaelan 8y ago
  Wikipedia was (but is moving off now).
  - jey 8y ago
    What are they moving to?
    - KenanSulayman 8y ago
      Plain PHP (php7). As of now they're still on HHVM though: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Version https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Version.
- vajrabum 8y ago
  Box did and probably still does.
- krapp 8y ago
  I was going to make a HN clone in Hack, but gave up because there was no real community around the language, I couldn't find decent hosting and documentation was sparse. It's a good language, especially if you're one of those people who like PHP except for the few irritating things Hack fixes, it just seems like it died before it could get a good community around it.
- deftnerd 8y ago
  I will be forever grateful for Hack spurring some huge improvements in PHP from the 5 to the 7 branch when they were pretty compatible with each other. I just don't see a reason to follow them on this journey since they decided not to be compatible with PHP back in 3.3.
- lclarkmichalek 8y ago
  I think Slack does: https://slack.engineering/taking-php-seriously-cf7a60065329 https://slack.engineering/taking-php-seriously-cf7a60065329
- smt88 8y ago
  Some WordPress hosts were using it
  - kyriakos 8y ago
    But with this release it will no longer be compatible.
- wink 8y ago
  At some point we made sure that phpMyFAQ works on HHVM - but afaik we never really got any feedback that anyone's actually using it, but we're not on the same level of users as phpMyAdmin for example :). And with this direction it will not be advertised or checked any more in the future either.
pushtheenvelope 8y ago
A lot of the narrative on HN seems to be that PHP7 has adopted most of the benefits of HHVM (performance) and Hack (typehints). If you read this blog post closely, you will notice several interesting points in the Future Changes, which hint at making Hack a significantly saner language than PHP, especially around type-soundness. > Several behaviors will be removed from PHP arrays; the general principle is that PHP arrays should work as “vec or dict”. > Int-like string keys will not be converted to integers. > Binding references to array elements will not be permitted. > The values null, false, or uninitialized variables will not be able to be treated as arrays. > Empty strings will not be able to be treated as arrays. > Arrays will not be able to be compared to non-arrays. > Non-arraykey values will not be able to be used as array keys and will not be automatically coerced. > Arrays will not be able to be used with the plus (+) operator. This is a massive change that goes a long way towards making the most prominent, core data structure of any php codebase be sound. Other examples of introducing type soundness: > Undefined constants will no longer be converted to strings > ints will wrap in future releases, instead of being converted to floats, allowing the type of int + int to be int, instead of int + int = num.
- wink 8y ago
  I'm not sure anyone is debating that in the terms of PHP7 vs HHVM. Hack has been a different language for quite some time and that is exactly the problem. The more it diverged from PHP the less sense it made for most people to go that direction. Also on a personal level I'm really not sure why anyone would want to go that direction. Of all the problems people usually say they have with PHP, just fixing the type system is not even close to #1. If Hack then really is a different language and you don't like PHP, why not migrate to something completely different?
  - pushtheenvelope 8y ago
    Hack layered a sane type system on the existing runtime, but the changes above are all about runtime logic. These type coercions lead to many subtle bugs in PHP programs. What this demonstrates is that one can have a much safer programming language while keeping the key attributes of PHP that make it great: each web request having isolated state, concurrency model, and programmer workflow (ref. https://slack.engineering/taking-php-seriously-cf7a60065329 https://slack.engineering/taking-php-seriously-cf7a60065329). Yes, I'm not necessarily advocating for any web developer to start building in Hack now -- mainly because it lacks PHP's rich ecosystem. The good folks working on the PHP language may be interested in these changes though.
jacobwg 8y ago
> We are currently working to move to a package manager that fully supports multiple languages. I wonder if this is related to the plans to add a pluggable architecture to Yarn 2.0 and support languages other than JavaScript. https://github.com/yarnpkg/yarn/issues/6953 https://github.com/yarnpkg/yarn/issues/6953

32 points by marksamman 8y ago

johnmaguire2013 8y ago

> With this release, we no longer aim to be compatible with PHP. Looks like a big release! I'm curious -- is anyone actually using HHVM, either in production or for personal use?

chrisseaton 8y ago
> is anyone actually using HHVM Aren't Facebook using it?
- johnmaguire2013 8y ago
  Besides Facebook...
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
Gaelan 8y ago
Wikipedia was (but is moving off now).
- jey 8y ago
  What are they moving to?
  - KenanSulayman 8y ago
    Plain PHP (php7). As of now they're still on HHVM though: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Version https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Version.
vajrabum 8y ago
Box did and probably still does.
krapp 8y ago
I was going to make a HN clone in Hack, but gave up because there was no real community around the language, I couldn't find decent hosting and documentation was sparse. It's a good language, especially if you're one of those people who like PHP except for the few irritating things Hack fixes, it just seems like it died before it could get a good community around it.
deftnerd 8y ago
I will be forever grateful for Hack spurring some huge improvements in PHP from the 5 to the 7 branch when they were pretty compatible with each other. I just don't see a reason to follow them on this journey since they decided not to be compatible with PHP back in 3.3.
lclarkmichalek 8y ago
I think Slack does: https://slack.engineering/taking-php-seriously-cf7a60065329 https://slack.engineering/taking-php-seriously-cf7a60065329
smt88 8y ago
Some WordPress hosts were using it
- kyriakos 8y ago
  But with this release it will no longer be compatible.
wink 8y ago
At some point we made sure that phpMyFAQ works on HHVM - but afaik we never really got any feedback that anyone's actually using it, but we're not on the same level of users as phpMyAdmin for example :). And with this direction it will not be advertised or checked any more in the future either.

pushtheenvelope 8y ago

A lot of the narrative on HN seems to be that PHP7 has adopted most of the benefits of HHVM (performance) and Hack (typehints). If you read this blog post closely, you will notice several interesting points in the Future Changes, which hint at making Hack a significantly saner language than PHP, especially around type-soundness. > Several behaviors will be removed from PHP arrays; the general principle is that PHP arrays should work as “vec or dict”. > Int-like string keys will not be converted to integers. > Binding references to array elements will not be permitted. > The values null, false, or uninitialized variables will not be able to be treated as arrays. > Empty strings will not be able to be treated as arrays. > Arrays will not be able to be compared to non-arrays. > Non-arraykey values will not be able to be used as array keys and will not be automatically coerced. > Arrays will not be able to be used with the plus (+) operator. This is a massive change that goes a long way towards making the most prominent, core data structure of any php codebase be sound. Other examples of introducing type soundness: > Undefined constants will no longer be converted to strings > ints will wrap in future releases, instead of being converted to floats, allowing the type of int + int to be int, instead of int + int = num.

wink 8y ago
I'm not sure anyone is debating that in the terms of PHP7 vs HHVM. Hack has been a different language for quite some time and that is exactly the problem. The more it diverged from PHP the less sense it made for most people to go that direction. Also on a personal level I'm really not sure why anyone would want to go that direction. Of all the problems people usually say they have with PHP, just fixing the type system is not even close to #1. If Hack then really is a different language and you don't like PHP, why not migrate to something completely different?
- pushtheenvelope 8y ago
  Hack layered a sane type system on the existing runtime, but the changes above are all about runtime logic. These type coercions lead to many subtle bugs in PHP programs. What this demonstrates is that one can have a much safer programming language while keeping the key attributes of PHP that make it great: each web request having isolated state, concurrency model, and programmer workflow (ref. https://slack.engineering/taking-php-seriously-cf7a60065329 https://slack.engineering/taking-php-seriously-cf7a60065329). Yes, I'm not necessarily advocating for any web developer to start building in Hack now -- mainly because it lacks PHP's rich ecosystem. The good folks working on the PHP language may be interested in these changes though.

jacobwg 8y ago

> We are currently working to move to a package manager that fully supports multiple languages. I wonder if this is related to the plans to add a pluggable architecture to Yarn 2.0 and support languages other than JavaScript. https://github.com/yarnpkg/yarn/issues/6953 https://github.com/yarnpkg/yarn/issues/6953