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>Nor C++ or Ada, so what? Volumes could be written as a reply. >Linux isn't some kind of golden rule for all OSes on the galaxy. Just about every operating s

>Nor C++ or Ada, so what? Volumes could be written as a reply. >Linux isn't some kind of golden rule for all OSes on the galaxy. Just about every operating system or major piece of system software is written in C, or limited C++ that is defacto C. Rust has a universe more of a likelihood to supplant those than Go or C#. And in fact is the only modern language making any headway in those cases. We're about two decades past people deploying the trite "Oh well that's just legacy inertia..." argument. Google didn't write Fuchsia in Go, and hasn't used an iota of it in ChromeOS or Android. Microsoft uses somewhere approximating 0% .NET/C# code in the Windows core. Microsoft research made a toy .NET OS once that, unsurprisingly, went nowhere, just as you can find irrelevant toy example projects pushing the same premise, but they're dead ends. This is of course meaningless for the vast majority of projects that the residents of HN are working on, where the compromises of Go, C#/.NET, GCs, etc, are massively outweighed by the benefits they bring to those sorts of projects. >I am more than happy to do bare metal coding in C# (Meadow) and Go (TinyGo) without having to deal with Linux. Okay?

pjmlp 5y ago
Waiting for that volume to arrive. As for the rest it would be a waste of my time on Earth to prove you wrong and change your mind. Okay?
- defaultname 5y ago
  Yes, that is okay. There is little you could say on this that would be convincing given the every action of Microsoft, Google, and ranks of proven, competent developers who are building so-called low-level systems that power the world. I concur that it would be a "waste of time".
  - pjmlp 5y ago
    After all, I am willing to waste some minutes with you. Since IBM i, IBM z, Unisys ClearPath exist, and power the world of insurances and finance, this sentence is obviously false. > Google didn't write Fuchsia in Go Indeed, only the TCP/IP stack and volume management tooling, should be easy for you to find out about them. Then there is this thing called gVisor, it is powering parts of the world that run on top of Google Kubernetes Engine. Maybe something there for you to learn as well. > Microsoft uses somewhere approximating 0% .NET/C# code in the Windows core On the NT kernel, yes, yet good luck using Windows only with the kernel, without the remaining layers, many of which developed in a mix of COM and .NET. A basic proof how much Windows systems programming experience you have. Ah then there is this thing called IoT Edge runtime for intelligent devices, written in a mix of Rust and C#. And before I forget, NVIDIA DRIVE AGX firmware is written in Ada/SPARK. Bye and learn to grow beyond the Linux bubble.
    - defaultname 5y ago
      Not only did Google not write Fucshia in Go, they explicitly made it a forbidden language (listing a litany of reasons to exclude it and any other GC language -- the same reasons that apply to most "low-level" code), they set a goal to migrate any parts imported in. Maybe not the best example. "A basic proof how much Windows systems programming experience you have." Which programming language would one write "COM" in? I am so poorly skilled that I must have missed that language. I spent a decade+ writing Windows code, including exposing it through COM/COM+/DCOM, but apparently I was doing it wrong. And while there is loads of C++ in what we consider the Windows platform, there is vanishingly little .NET. The "Linux bubble" comment is especially weird. I spend my day in macOS, with most of my day being in XCode slinging Swift and GoLand spinning Go. Somehow I can evaluate the world without trying to mangle it to fit whatever my current primary skills are.
      - exdsq 5y ago
        I don't really follow what you two are arguing about - I think it's pretty clear you can in theory write systems-level programs in most of those languages. However if the focus is on Operating Systems, there have been a few formally verified OS's written in Ada/Spark that are worth looking at (if I correctly read these posts as saying that's not possible).
        defaultname 5y ago
        It's kind of all over the place. The initial point is simply that Go or C# or Java in their normal form aren't "system programming" suitable (which generally means low-level kernels and system services and projects having similar needs. Notepad on Windows isn't system programming), and it's unrealistic for Go to be ranked highly on such a list, much less before Rust which is purpose built for this task. Could someone use them for system programming? Sure they could. It would be the wrong tool but people makes loads of bad decisions. The point about Linux and other operating system choices wasn't a rule, it was an observation that the rhetoric often plied on developer boards -- usually where developers want everything to be a nail to their skillset hammer -- has little correlation with the world. Nowhere did I exclude Ada or any other compiled, non-GCd (which Ada never uses when used for anything of any criticality) languages. Anything can make just as good of native code.
mst 5y ago
> Just about every operating system or major piece of system software is written in C My friends writing safety critical bare metal industrial control software using Ada would, I suspect, feel this was a somewhat limited perspective. If you ever do consider writing such volumes, I would recommend getting co-authors to cover the areas you're less familiar with.
- defaultname 5y ago
  Given that I said "just about", ergo not all, I'm not quite sure what the point of your comment is. Pointing out that someone somewhere is using something else, even haughtily adding some ill-considered snark, doesn't seem particularly useful in that context. It's a big industry. There are loads of exceptions and they still comprise a tiny minority.
  - mst 5y ago
    "just about" is still a vast overestimate, but you're right - while I did my best to be polite while pointing out the extent to which the wall of ill-considered snark I was replying to was, at best, woefully underinformed, I readily admit that I did still fall somewhat short.
    - defaultname 5y ago
      "while I did my best to be polite while pointing out the extent to which the wall of ill-considered snark I was replying to was, at best, woefully underinformed, I readily admit that I did still fall somewhat short." I was being polite in not openly pointing out that your comment was trolling of absolutely no value or purpose, predicated entirely on your own misreading, but here we are.

pjmlp 5y ago

Waiting for that volume to arrive. As for the rest it would be a waste of my time on Earth to prove you wrong and change your mind. Okay?

defaultname 5y ago
Yes, that is okay. There is little you could say on this that would be convincing given the every action of Microsoft, Google, and ranks of proven, competent developers who are building so-called low-level systems that power the world. I concur that it would be a "waste of time".
- pjmlp 5y ago
  After all, I am willing to waste some minutes with you. Since IBM i, IBM z, Unisys ClearPath exist, and power the world of insurances and finance, this sentence is obviously false. > Google didn't write Fuchsia in Go Indeed, only the TCP/IP stack and volume management tooling, should be easy for you to find out about them. Then there is this thing called gVisor, it is powering parts of the world that run on top of Google Kubernetes Engine. Maybe something there for you to learn as well. > Microsoft uses somewhere approximating 0% .NET/C# code in the Windows core On the NT kernel, yes, yet good luck using Windows only with the kernel, without the remaining layers, many of which developed in a mix of COM and .NET. A basic proof how much Windows systems programming experience you have. Ah then there is this thing called IoT Edge runtime for intelligent devices, written in a mix of Rust and C#. And before I forget, NVIDIA DRIVE AGX firmware is written in Ada/SPARK. Bye and learn to grow beyond the Linux bubble.
  - defaultname 5y ago
    Not only did Google not write Fucshia in Go, they explicitly made it a forbidden language (listing a litany of reasons to exclude it and any other GC language -- the same reasons that apply to most "low-level" code), they set a goal to migrate any parts imported in. Maybe not the best example. "A basic proof how much Windows systems programming experience you have." Which programming language would one write "COM" in? I am so poorly skilled that I must have missed that language. I spent a decade+ writing Windows code, including exposing it through COM/COM+/DCOM, but apparently I was doing it wrong. And while there is loads of C++ in what we consider the Windows platform, there is vanishingly little .NET. The "Linux bubble" comment is especially weird. I spend my day in macOS, with most of my day being in XCode slinging Swift and GoLand spinning Go. Somehow I can evaluate the world without trying to mangle it to fit whatever my current primary skills are.
    - exdsq 5y ago
      I don't really follow what you two are arguing about - I think it's pretty clear you can in theory write systems-level programs in most of those languages. However if the focus is on Operating Systems, there have been a few formally verified OS's written in Ada/Spark that are worth looking at (if I correctly read these posts as saying that's not possible).
      - defaultname 5y ago
        It's kind of all over the place. The initial point is simply that Go or C# or Java in their normal form aren't "system programming" suitable (which generally means low-level kernels and system services and projects having similar needs. Notepad on Windows isn't system programming), and it's unrealistic for Go to be ranked highly on such a list, much less before Rust which is purpose built for this task. Could someone use them for system programming? Sure they could. It would be the wrong tool but people makes loads of bad decisions. The point about Linux and other operating system choices wasn't a rule, it was an observation that the rhetoric often plied on developer boards -- usually where developers want everything to be a nail to their skillset hammer -- has little correlation with the world. Nowhere did I exclude Ada or any other compiled, non-GCd (which Ada never uses when used for anything of any criticality) languages. Anything can make just as good of native code.

mst 5y ago

> Just about every operating system or major piece of system software is written in C My friends writing safety critical bare metal industrial control software using Ada would, I suspect, feel this was a somewhat limited perspective. If you ever do consider writing such volumes, I would recommend getting co-authors to cover the areas you're less familiar with.

defaultname 5y ago
Given that I said "just about", ergo not all, I'm not quite sure what the point of your comment is. Pointing out that someone somewhere is using something else, even haughtily adding some ill-considered snark, doesn't seem particularly useful in that context. It's a big industry. There are loads of exceptions and they still comprise a tiny minority.
- mst 5y ago
  "just about" is still a vast overestimate, but you're right - while I did my best to be polite while pointing out the extent to which the wall of ill-considered snark I was replying to was, at best, woefully underinformed, I readily admit that I did still fall somewhat short.
  - defaultname 5y ago
    "while I did my best to be polite while pointing out the extent to which the wall of ill-considered snark I was replying to was, at best, woefully underinformed, I readily admit that I did still fall somewhat short." I was being polite in not openly pointing out that your comment was trolling of absolutely no value or purpose, predicated entirely on your own misreading, but here we are.