This seems pretty unfair to bash - bash version is way longer than needed, both because it does more (more fields, difference tracking) and because it is writte

This seems pretty unfair to bash - bash version is way longer than needed, both because it does more (more fields, difference tracking) and because it is written very vebosely (very long prefixes on each var, using multiple calls instead of single “read” command) I really dislike those comparisons where one side wins not because the language is better, but because it does much less.