7 ms·

Consider using Go instead, as a replacement for C.

thayne 5y ago
For some cases that's fine, but go has terrible FFI, which make it unsuitable for some use cases, and being garbage collected makes it unsuitable for others.
relyks 5y ago
What about Rust?
- 37ef_ced3 5y ago
  Too complicated. Rust is more similar to C++ than it is to C.
  - eternityforest 5y ago
    What's wrong with that? Rust seems to be fully capable of doing low level things like drivers and kernels, so why would you choose less abstraction and safety instead of more?
    - sk0g 5y ago
      In a time where C++ exists, C still gets used. C interop is even easier in C++ than Rust IIRC, so given the choice, C++ would get the nod much earlier I'd imagine. That said, people use C because it forgoes abstractions and complications. Neither C++ nor Rust provide that experience. I think Go comes the closest, while being a bit nicer to work with overall.
      - gefhfffh 5y ago
        C++ is way more complicated than Rust though.
        jack_pp 5y ago
        C++ has more features than Rust but you can limit yourself pretty severely and use "simple" features to get far more safety and convenience than C without having to wrap your mind around Rust.
        gefhfffh 5y ago
        True for your new project from scratch when you already sucked up C++ such that you know what&when. But at this point you know C++ pretty well (including all what you don't want to use, take a look at the CPP Core Guidelines), and using Rust is almost trivial, since Rust doesn't really introduce anything really new you wouldn't be already familiar with. At least that was my experience.
      - pjmlp 5y ago
        Due to UNIX clones, and religious cargo cult on some embedded circles.
      - nicoburns 5y ago
        I’d say zig is closest C replacement.
        eggy 5y ago
        I agree, and much easier than Rust to get going and then some. Other than playing with Nannou in Rust to 'get' the language, and the Rust book, I started a toy game in Zig without more than the skeleton put together here: https://github.com/michal-z/zig-gamedev https://github.com/michal-z/zig-gamedev I like Raylib, and there are bindings for most popular languages, but I like the minimalism I can start with fairly quickly in Zig. I tried Bevy for Rust, but it is a lot more involved, and Rust, so Zig it is for now. For safety, and high-integrity software, I am sticking with SPARK2014. Rust will get there soon, but Ada/SPARK2014 have such a lead, maturity, and industry take up that I am putting Rust down for another year or more.
        eternityforest 5y ago
        I kinda wish SPARK were mainstream. Ada kind of aims for the same things as Rust, but it's been around such a long time. It's amazing how long C has stayed around.
        Tozen 5y ago
        That's a bit debatable. Vlang is right there too. This would all be relative to what people are trying to do. Many people might really be looking for a C and C++ replacement, of which there are a number of viable alternatives (including good old Object Pascal), but then preferences and other factors makes things cloudy.
        eternityforest 5y ago
        Rust is the one Torvalds seems most interested in, and I suspect that's a deciding factor. Zig might be the most direct upgrade from C, but it seems like rust can mostly replace the entire concept of portable assembly, since it has zero cost abstractions.
      - eternityforest 5y ago
        The question is whether they should be foregoing those abstractions and complications. C is not a language known for high security or reliability, nor is it known for being fast or easy to develop in, so by my guess based on vague anecdotal evidence, it seems that defaulting to the highest level of abstraction unless forced to do otherwise by some specific requirement is a better plan. C and direct C replacements advertise simplicity, but if the simplicity doesn't buy you any reliability in practice, why bother with it?
      - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
        > That said, people use C because it forgoes abstractions and complications. Neither C++ nor Rust provide that experience. There's almost no C code you could write in an effort to "forego abstractions and complications" that isn't also C++.
  - wejick 5y ago
    I tried multiple times to grok rust, but it's still too difficult for me to understand and be comfortable. In contrary go other than the struggle of unused variable compile error, I can use it within hours.
  - thayne 5y ago
    Maybe. But it's still closer to C than go is.
dvh 5y ago
Isn't there a danger that go will be cancelled?
- phendrenad2 5y ago
  I think Go has gained enough fans that it'll survive somehow, in some form, for a long time.
- paskozdilar 5y ago
  Not at all, as long as Rob Pike is alive, I believe.
  - johndough 5y ago
    Rob Pike is 66 and the average male life expectancy in America is 76 years. Of course I wish him to live happily for many more years, but it would be presumptuous to expect him to work on Go for the rest of his life. But although google has killed 264 projects so far [1], I believe that Go has too many dependents at Google and in industry to cancel. And even if it should happen anyway, the community will fork it. [1] https://killedbygoogle.com/ https://killedbygoogle.com/
    - veltas 5y ago
      Life expectancy of a 66 year old is 83.
      - johndough 5y ago
        I stand corrected. I also forgot to consider that Rob Pike is Canadian, which further improves his statistical chances.
      - mirekrusin 5y ago
        Must be at least 10y more if you don’t use Java.
    - gompertz 5y ago
kaba0 5y ago
Go is a high level language, it doesn’t share any quality with C, other than perhaps bad expressiveness.
- pjmlp 5y ago
  "C Is Not a Low-level Language Your computer is not a fast PDP-11." https://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=3212479 https://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=3212479
  - saagarjha 5y ago
    But many microcontrollers are and their toolchains do treat it as such.
    - pjmlp 5y ago
      Just like other programming languages, C is not a special snowflake. https://www.f-secure.com/en/consulting/foundry https://www.f-secure.com/en/consulting/foundry https://developer.arm.com/solutions/internet-of-things/languages-and-libraries/go https://developer.arm.com/solutions/internet-of-things/langu...
  - badsectoracula 5y ago
    That article completely misses the point - assembly (or machine code) might not be how the "metal" works on a modern desktop(-like) CPU, but that is irrelevant when that is the lowest level that said CPUs are exposing. On such CPUs C is at the lower levels possible. But also C isn't just for Intel, x86 and (some) ARM CPUs, there are other targets it has.
    - pjmlp 5y ago
      Nothing of that is exclusive to C, please provide an example of a CPU where C is the only compiler toolchain available, and exposes CPU capabilities without using language extensions. Any example with language extensions to ISO C, allows me to provide a counter example with language extensions. Any example where only a subset of ISO C is allowed, allows me to provide a counter example with a language subset.

For some cases that's fine, but go has terrible FFI, which make it unsuitable for some use cases, and being garbage collected makes it unsuitable for others.

relyks 5y ago

What about Rust?

37ef_ced3 5y ago
Too complicated. Rust is more similar to C++ than it is to C.
- eternityforest 5y ago
  What's wrong with that? Rust seems to be fully capable of doing low level things like drivers and kernels, so why would you choose less abstraction and safety instead of more?
  - sk0g 5y ago
    In a time where C++ exists, C still gets used. C interop is even easier in C++ than Rust IIRC, so given the choice, C++ would get the nod much earlier I'd imagine. That said, people use C because it forgoes abstractions and complications. Neither C++ nor Rust provide that experience. I think Go comes the closest, while being a bit nicer to work with overall.
    - gefhfffh 5y ago
      C++ is way more complicated than Rust though.
      - jack_pp 5y ago
        C++ has more features than Rust but you can limit yourself pretty severely and use "simple" features to get far more safety and convenience than C without having to wrap your mind around Rust.
        gefhfffh 5y ago
        True for your new project from scratch when you already sucked up C++ such that you know what&when. But at this point you know C++ pretty well (including all what you don't want to use, take a look at the CPP Core Guidelines), and using Rust is almost trivial, since Rust doesn't really introduce anything really new you wouldn't be already familiar with. At least that was my experience.
    - pjmlp 5y ago
      Due to UNIX clones, and religious cargo cult on some embedded circles.
    - nicoburns 5y ago
      I’d say zig is closest C replacement.
      - eggy 5y ago
        I agree, and much easier than Rust to get going and then some. Other than playing with Nannou in Rust to 'get' the language, and the Rust book, I started a toy game in Zig without more than the skeleton put together here: https://github.com/michal-z/zig-gamedev https://github.com/michal-z/zig-gamedev I like Raylib, and there are bindings for most popular languages, but I like the minimalism I can start with fairly quickly in Zig. I tried Bevy for Rust, but it is a lot more involved, and Rust, so Zig it is for now. For safety, and high-integrity software, I am sticking with SPARK2014. Rust will get there soon, but Ada/SPARK2014 have such a lead, maturity, and industry take up that I am putting Rust down for another year or more.
        eternityforest 5y ago
        I kinda wish SPARK were mainstream. Ada kind of aims for the same things as Rust, but it's been around such a long time. It's amazing how long C has stayed around.
      - Tozen 5y ago
        That's a bit debatable. Vlang is right there too. This would all be relative to what people are trying to do. Many people might really be looking for a C and C++ replacement, of which there are a number of viable alternatives (including good old Object Pascal), but then preferences and other factors makes things cloudy.
      - eternityforest 5y ago
        Rust is the one Torvalds seems most interested in, and I suspect that's a deciding factor. Zig might be the most direct upgrade from C, but it seems like rust can mostly replace the entire concept of portable assembly, since it has zero cost abstractions.
    - eternityforest 5y ago
      The question is whether they should be foregoing those abstractions and complications. C is not a language known for high security or reliability, nor is it known for being fast or easy to develop in, so by my guess based on vague anecdotal evidence, it seems that defaulting to the highest level of abstraction unless forced to do otherwise by some specific requirement is a better plan. C and direct C replacements advertise simplicity, but if the simplicity doesn't buy you any reliability in practice, why bother with it?
    - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
      > That said, people use C because it forgoes abstractions and complications. Neither C++ nor Rust provide that experience. There's almost no C code you could write in an effort to "forego abstractions and complications" that isn't also C++.
- wejick 5y ago
  I tried multiple times to grok rust, but it's still too difficult for me to understand and be comfortable. In contrary go other than the struggle of unused variable compile error, I can use it within hours.
- thayne 5y ago
  Maybe. But it's still closer to C than go is.

dvh 5y ago

Isn't there a danger that go will be cancelled?

phendrenad2 5y ago
I think Go has gained enough fans that it'll survive somehow, in some form, for a long time.
paskozdilar 5y ago
Not at all, as long as Rob Pike is alive, I believe.
- johndough 5y ago
  Rob Pike is 66 and the average male life expectancy in America is 76 years. Of course I wish him to live happily for many more years, but it would be presumptuous to expect him to work on Go for the rest of his life. But although google has killed 264 projects so far [1], I believe that Go has too many dependents at Google and in industry to cancel. And even if it should happen anyway, the community will fork it. [1] https://killedbygoogle.com/ https://killedbygoogle.com/
  - veltas 5y ago
    Life expectancy of a 66 year old is 83.
    - johndough 5y ago
      I stand corrected. I also forgot to consider that Rob Pike is Canadian, which further improves his statistical chances.
    - mirekrusin 5y ago
      Must be at least 10y more if you don’t use Java.
  - gompertz 5y ago

kaba0 5y ago

Go is a high level language, it doesn’t share any quality with C, other than perhaps bad expressiveness.

pjmlp 5y ago
"C Is Not a Low-level Language Your computer is not a fast PDP-11." https://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=3212479 https://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=3212479
- saagarjha 5y ago
  But many microcontrollers are and their toolchains do treat it as such.
  - pjmlp 5y ago
    Just like other programming languages, C is not a special snowflake. https://www.f-secure.com/en/consulting/foundry https://www.f-secure.com/en/consulting/foundry https://developer.arm.com/solutions/internet-of-things/languages-and-libraries/go https://developer.arm.com/solutions/internet-of-things/langu...
- badsectoracula 5y ago
  That article completely misses the point - assembly (or machine code) might not be how the "metal" works on a modern desktop(-like) CPU, but that is irrelevant when that is the lowest level that said CPUs are exposing. On such CPUs C is at the lower levels possible. But also C isn't just for Intel, x86 and (some) ARM CPUs, there are other targets it has.
  - pjmlp 5y ago
    Nothing of that is exclusive to C, please provide an example of a CPU where C is the only compiler toolchain available, and exposes CPU capabilities without using language extensions. Any example with language extensions to ISO C, allows me to provide a counter example with language extensions. Any example where only a subset of ISO C is allowed, allows me to provide a counter example with a language subset.