4 ms·

Why not? Programming languages are not a solved problem (or parsing, or diagnostics, or...). We are today, barely, getting practical solutions to how write sa

by mamcx 6y ago

Why not? Programming languages are not a solved problem (or parsing, or diagnostics, or...). We are today, barely, getting practical solutions to how write safely, fast and ergonomic (for example, rust) and yet: - Compiling performance is abysmal in most compiled langs (except pascal family) - And errors... - And debugging... - And interactive compilers... - And ... (thousands of other stuff) Somebody must try to do this stuff, because if not, forever will be at mercy of C, C++, JS, the shell, unix, etc. Who wanna the cobol effect forever?

blackrock 6y ago
Why is Pascal better at compiling performance?
- jodrellblank 6y ago
  Nicklaus Wirth cared about not wasting machine resources. He also wrote “a plea for lean software”: > “Abstract: Software's girth has surpassed its functionality, largely because hardware advances make this possible. The way to streamline software lies in disciplined methodologies and a return to the essentials. The paper discusses some causes of "fat software" and considers the Oberon system whose primary goal was to show that software can be developed with a fraction of the memory capacity and processor power usually required, without sacrificing flexibility, functionality, or user convenience.”
- mamcx 6y ago
  Is made to be fast. Also, C/C++/rust is made to be slow. One recent article that touch it (for rust): https://pingcap.com/blog/rust-compilation-model-calamity https://pingcap.com/blog/rust-compilation-model-calamity
  - blackrock 6y ago
    It seems like one problem with rust is that it is a single threaded compiler. We’ve reached the ends of fast CPUs. To gain performance improvements, we need to use multiple cores, and process it in parallel. I wonder if this is an opportunity for github or Microsoft to host a cloud compiler? Just check in your code to github, and the cloud compiler will compile it across thousands of servers, all running in parallel. Cost: $100/month per engineer.
    - mamcx 6y ago
      > It seems like one problem with rust is that it is a single threaded compiler. That could be a symptom but is not the root cause.Is just that the syntax/features choices (as choiced!) are hostile to fast performance. Even going parallel, I bet a pascal compiler will beat it overly, because you can give rockets to turtles but are still turtles...

by mamcx 6y ago

blackrock 6y ago

Why is Pascal better at compiling performance?

jodrellblank 6y ago
Nicklaus Wirth cared about not wasting machine resources. He also wrote “a plea for lean software”: > “Abstract: Software's girth has surpassed its functionality, largely because hardware advances make this possible. The way to streamline software lies in disciplined methodologies and a return to the essentials. The paper discusses some causes of "fat software" and considers the Oberon system whose primary goal was to show that software can be developed with a fraction of the memory capacity and processor power usually required, without sacrificing flexibility, functionality, or user convenience.”
mamcx 6y ago
Is made to be fast. Also, C/C++/rust is made to be slow. One recent article that touch it (for rust): https://pingcap.com/blog/rust-compilation-model-calamity https://pingcap.com/blog/rust-compilation-model-calamity
- blackrock 6y ago
  It seems like one problem with rust is that it is a single threaded compiler. We’ve reached the ends of fast CPUs. To gain performance improvements, we need to use multiple cores, and process it in parallel. I wonder if this is an opportunity for github or Microsoft to host a cloud compiler? Just check in your code to github, and the cloud compiler will compile it across thousands of servers, all running in parallel. Cost: $100/month per engineer.
  - mamcx 6y ago
    > It seems like one problem with rust is that it is a single threaded compiler. That could be a symptom but is not the root cause.Is just that the syntax/features choices (as choiced!) are hostile to fast performance. Even going parallel, I bet a pascal compiler will beat it overly, because you can give rockets to turtles but are still turtles...