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Vala does not seem to get much attention. It borrows C# syntax (and maybe Java), compiles down to C and offers nearly symmetrical interoperability as a result.

by gmt2027 14y ago

Vala does not seem to get much attention. It borrows C# syntax (and maybe Java), compiles down to C and offers nearly symmetrical interoperability as a result. I believe Ubuntu's Unity is written in Vala. Knowing Java, it was easy to acquire the syntax from the tutorial [https://live.gnome.org/Vala/Tutorial https://live.gnome.org/Vala/Tutorial] in very little time. For transparent access to compiled C libraries, external C functions need to be declared in a 'vapi' file and although these were already provided for a large part of the GNOME ecosystem, documentation on vapi syntax was nearly non-existent. Object-orientation and standard libraries are integrated with Gnome's GObject system and Glib libraries which I found unfamiliar and usually better documented in C at the time.

qxcv 14y ago
If it has GObject as a dependency, then it's not designed for "low-level systems programming". Hell, just having a GC more-or-less discounts it due to the associated problems with runtime size and performance[0]. As a general rule of thumb: if you can't write a kernel in it, it's not a systems language. [0] It is possible to write a systems language with these features, but low-level systems stuff is not what Vala was designed for.
- gmt2027 14y ago
  GObject itself is not a dependency, Inheriting from GLib.GObject provides support for features like introspection and better integration with the collections framework and GLib libraries. However, lightweight 'non-object classes' are supported but treated differently by the compiler. There is a slight variation in constructor syntax between plain objects and GObjects. As far as I know there is no Vala runtime or garbage collector. Memory management is by automatic reference counting but there is support for manual C++-style pointer syntax with new and delete operators. I agree that Vala was not specifically designed for 'low-level systems stuff' but I see no reason why this is not technically possible. The Vala compiler is a source-to-source translator to C and in my previous experience worked fairly well interfacing with fairly low-level C libraries like MPI and OpenCL. I assume that a kernel writer does not require much more than a limited subset of the language that supports C pointers, structs and arrays.

by gmt2027 14y ago

qxcv 14y ago

If it has GObject as a dependency, then it's not designed for "low-level systems programming". Hell, just having a GC more-or-less discounts it due to the associated problems with runtime size and performance[0]. As a general rule of thumb: if you can't write a kernel in it, it's not a systems language. [0] It is possible to write a systems language with these features, but low-level systems stuff is not what Vala was designed for.

gmt2027 14y ago
GObject itself is not a dependency, Inheriting from GLib.GObject provides support for features like introspection and better integration with the collections framework and GLib libraries. However, lightweight 'non-object classes' are supported but treated differently by the compiler. There is a slight variation in constructor syntax between plain objects and GObjects. As far as I know there is no Vala runtime or garbage collector. Memory management is by automatic reference counting but there is support for manual C++-style pointer syntax with new and delete operators. I agree that Vala was not specifically designed for 'low-level systems stuff' but I see no reason why this is not technically possible. The Vala compiler is a source-to-source translator to C and in my previous experience worked fairly well interfacing with fairly low-level C libraries like MPI and OpenCL. I assume that a kernel writer does not require much more than a limited subset of the language that supports C pointers, structs and arrays.