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I'm a tiny bit worried by the way they are pushing development of so many products not directly related to core language development (a GitHub clone! A kernel!)

I'm a tiny bit worried by the way they are pushing development of so many products not directly related to core language development (a GitHub clone! A kernel!) and not focusing on creating a proper compiler. Maybe they are fine with leaving V as a transpired language indefinitely, but I think that developing this extra stuff is not going to persuade users to switch to V. With that being said, it's quite possible that the core maintainers aren't touching the extra fun stuff and are still focusing on language development. Maybe someday I should try learning V again. I was going to learn it over the summer of 2020 to expand my repertoire beyond C++, but I gave up fairly quickly and ended up learning Qt instead, which has proved to be a very wise choice - knowing Qt why I have my current job (for multiple reasons).

capableweb 3y ago
If you develop a language without any actual projects using the language, how would you know what to actually make the language do? Seems to me they're trying to dog food the project which makes sense to me.
- Conscat 3y ago
  Interestingly, V is named after the chat client Volt, which V was originally invented specifically to develop.
colesantiago 3y ago
> I'm a tiny bit worried by the way they are pushing development of so many products not directly related to core language development (a GitHub clone! A kernel!) and not focusing on creating a proper compiler. So showcasing what the language and compiler can do is a bad thing?
- LorenDB 3y ago
  Not at all. I just am worried for them that they are going to get wrapped up in complex projects like Vinix and end up putting too much time into a project that few people are actually going to benefit from. A basic text editor (which I think they also have implemented) is going to be a much more practical way to demo your language without dumping lots of time into a complex task.
metalspot 3y ago
> proper compiler transpiling to C actually makes adoption much easier. if you create an entirely new compiler auditing and verifying that takes many years and tons of money before it can be used for anything serious.
- lelanthran 3y ago
  > transpiling to C actually makes adoption much easier. Well, maybe. I like transpiling to C because it brings with it all the hyper-optimisation that has gone into C compilers over decades. As a solo on-again/off-again language designer, I can attest that you really cannot fixate on language purity or similar stuff like that: the goal is to write a program in your new language as soon as possible, and implement the features that motivated you to create a new language in the first place. Transpiling to C is, in practice, no different from transpiling to assembler, with the advantage of portability and instant environment support (can call C libraries). I've got a featurelist I'd like to implement. Focusing on emitting machine-code or assembly eats away valuable time I could have instead used to create a feature, or 10.
kaba0 3y ago
> Maybe someday I should try learning V again Why? Correct me if I’m wrong but this language has literally no unique attributes that would make it different than D or Go, so you won’t improve as a developer from it at all. Not trying to dissuade you from it, afaik most of the initial false claims have been debunked and now V is a real thing, but what is left from it is.. really not that interesting to my eyes.
- riku_iki 3y ago
  I like how you can translate any C program to V automatically.
  - amedvednikov 3y ago
    Yep! Here's DOOM translated from C to V: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6oXrz3oRoEg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6oXrz3oRoEg
    - bakul 3y ago
      Some C programs, not all. For example Andy Sloane’s donut.c. Granted, it is beautifully obfuscated but still, it uses just standard C features. https://www.a1k0n.net/2006/09/15/obfuscated-c-donut.html https://www.a1k0n.net/2006/09/15/obfuscated-c-donut.html
- capableweb 3y ago
  > this language has literally no unique attributes that would make it different than D or Go I'm not familiar with D, but compared to Golang, it seems to have a bunch of goodies compared to it. Small list: immutability by default for lots of things, no null, small and fast compiler, "4 ways to manage memory", hot code reloading and repl. These are just the ones I could find on a quick skim, I'm sure there is more. > Not trying to dissuade you from it You are literally saying that it's not "interesting to my eyes" but then before that you say "you won’t improve as a developer from it at all", how is this not trying to dissuade someone?
  - 3y ago
amedvednikov 3y ago
Different people are working on different open source things they like, as the result the language has real world examples.
Tozen 3y ago
> by the way they are pushing development of so many products... "They" are many different people (developers or contributors). As an open-source project, people focus on what they like or may need. Furthermore, V has a native backend, in addition to others: C, JavaScript, WASM, etc... They've stated (on their website) that their plan is to eventually make the native backend the primary, as they close in on 1.0. The other backends can be seen, for those that have actually used or know of the language, by checking out the -b flag.
- bheadmaster 3y ago
  > V has a native backend It is important to note that (at the time of writing this comment) the native backend can compile only three examples in the `examples/` directory in the V compiler codebase: hello_world.v fizz_buzz.v rune.v All the other examples fail to compile when V is used with the `-b native` flag.

capableweb 3y ago

If you develop a language without any actual projects using the language, how would you know what to actually make the language do? Seems to me they're trying to dog food the project which makes sense to me.

Conscat 3y ago
Interestingly, V is named after the chat client Volt, which V was originally invented specifically to develop.

colesantiago 3y ago

> I'm a tiny bit worried by the way they are pushing development of so many products not directly related to core language development (a GitHub clone! A kernel!) and not focusing on creating a proper compiler. So showcasing what the language and compiler can do is a bad thing?

LorenDB 3y ago
Not at all. I just am worried for them that they are going to get wrapped up in complex projects like Vinix and end up putting too much time into a project that few people are actually going to benefit from. A basic text editor (which I think they also have implemented) is going to be a much more practical way to demo your language without dumping lots of time into a complex task.

metalspot 3y ago

> proper compiler transpiling to C actually makes adoption much easier. if you create an entirely new compiler auditing and verifying that takes many years and tons of money before it can be used for anything serious.

lelanthran 3y ago
> transpiling to C actually makes adoption much easier. Well, maybe. I like transpiling to C because it brings with it all the hyper-optimisation that has gone into C compilers over decades. As a solo on-again/off-again language designer, I can attest that you really cannot fixate on language purity or similar stuff like that: the goal is to write a program in your new language as soon as possible, and implement the features that motivated you to create a new language in the first place. Transpiling to C is, in practice, no different from transpiling to assembler, with the advantage of portability and instant environment support (can call C libraries). I've got a featurelist I'd like to implement. Focusing on emitting machine-code or assembly eats away valuable time I could have instead used to create a feature, or 10.

kaba0 3y ago

> Maybe someday I should try learning V again Why? Correct me if I’m wrong but this language has literally no unique attributes that would make it different than D or Go, so you won’t improve as a developer from it at all. Not trying to dissuade you from it, afaik most of the initial false claims have been debunked and now V is a real thing, but what is left from it is.. really not that interesting to my eyes.

riku_iki 3y ago
I like how you can translate any C program to V automatically.
- amedvednikov 3y ago
  Yep! Here's DOOM translated from C to V: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6oXrz3oRoEg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6oXrz3oRoEg
  - bakul 3y ago
    Some C programs, not all. For example Andy Sloane’s donut.c. Granted, it is beautifully obfuscated but still, it uses just standard C features. https://www.a1k0n.net/2006/09/15/obfuscated-c-donut.html https://www.a1k0n.net/2006/09/15/obfuscated-c-donut.html
capableweb 3y ago
> this language has literally no unique attributes that would make it different than D or Go I'm not familiar with D, but compared to Golang, it seems to have a bunch of goodies compared to it. Small list: immutability by default for lots of things, no null, small and fast compiler, "4 ways to manage memory", hot code reloading and repl. These are just the ones I could find on a quick skim, I'm sure there is more. > Not trying to dissuade you from it You are literally saying that it's not "interesting to my eyes" but then before that you say "you won’t improve as a developer from it at all", how is this not trying to dissuade someone?
- 3y ago

amedvednikov 3y ago

Different people are working on different open source things they like, as the result the language has real world examples.

Tozen 3y ago

> by the way they are pushing development of so many products... "They" are many different people (developers or contributors). As an open-source project, people focus on what they like or may need. Furthermore, V has a native backend, in addition to others: C, JavaScript, WASM, etc... They've stated (on their website) that their plan is to eventually make the native backend the primary, as they close in on 1.0. The other backends can be seen, for those that have actually used or know of the language, by checking out the -b flag.

bheadmaster 3y ago
> V has a native backend It is important to note that (at the time of writing this comment) the native backend can compile only three examples in the `examples/` directory in the V compiler codebase: hello_world.v fizz_buzz.v rune.v All the other examples fail to compile when V is used with the `-b native` flag.