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Sure it's a true statement. Even if you have to compile to different targets (and you do), that's much simpler than implementing shared dependencies on those di

by mrcwinn 12y ago

Sure it's a true statement. Even if you have to compile to different targets (and you do), that's much simpler than implementing shared dependencies on those different targets. When you deploy a binary with no external dependencies, you can (generally) set it and forget it. It's not to say there aren't meaningful differences across targets you need to account for, but it is "just easier" in my experience.

balls187 12y ago
So, it's not a function of compiled vs interpreted. It's about a single binary vs shared resources. So while you can't get a single binary with an interpreted language (you need the shared runtime), however you can also get shared libs using a compiled language. I've found doing cross platform development using NodeJS significantly easier than using C++ (of course I had to use compilers that didn't default to IEEE 764). So old.
- laumars 12y ago
  Minor nit pick, but theses days "interpreted" languages are also compiled. What we are really taking about is AOT vs JIT (though even here, there are AOT compiled languages that still require a supporting run time environment installed, such as Java)
  - yellowapple 12y ago
    Java's a bit of a special/odd case, since it's AOT-compiled into a bytecode that is then JIT-compiled into native instructions.
    - laumars 12y ago
      Not that unusual these days. CPython supports a similar intermediate binary (.pyo) and .NET does the same too, albeit the bytecode is shipped inside a PE.
      - steveklabnik 12y ago
        And you can't even get that from the language itself. While MRI (last I checked) doesn't support an intermediate file of its bytecode format, Rubinius does (.rbc), for example.
    - pjmlp 12y ago
      Excelcior JET, Atego, JamaicaVM, RoboVM, ART, CodenameOne, SubstrateVM are just a few of the available native compilers for Java.
- skrebbel 12y ago
  > So while you can't get a single binary with an interpreted language (you need the shared runtime) Offtopic nitpick: of course you can, just combine the runtime with the code and wrap it all in a single executable. E.g. http://www.py2exe.org http://www.py2exe.org does exactly this.

by mrcwinn 12y ago

balls187 12y ago

So, it's not a function of compiled vs interpreted. It's about a single binary vs shared resources. So while you can't get a single binary with an interpreted language (you need the shared runtime), however you can also get shared libs using a compiled language. I've found doing cross platform development using NodeJS significantly easier than using C++ (of course I had to use compilers that didn't default to IEEE 764). So old.

laumars 12y ago
Minor nit pick, but theses days "interpreted" languages are also compiled. What we are really taking about is AOT vs JIT (though even here, there are AOT compiled languages that still require a supporting run time environment installed, such as Java)
- yellowapple 12y ago
  Java's a bit of a special/odd case, since it's AOT-compiled into a bytecode that is then JIT-compiled into native instructions.
  - laumars 12y ago
    Not that unusual these days. CPython supports a similar intermediate binary (.pyo) and .NET does the same too, albeit the bytecode is shipped inside a PE.
    - steveklabnik 12y ago
      And you can't even get that from the language itself. While MRI (last I checked) doesn't support an intermediate file of its bytecode format, Rubinius does (.rbc), for example.
  - pjmlp 12y ago
    Excelcior JET, Atego, JamaicaVM, RoboVM, ART, CodenameOne, SubstrateVM are just a few of the available native compilers for Java.
skrebbel 12y ago
> So while you can't get a single binary with an interpreted language (you need the shared runtime) Offtopic nitpick: of course you can, just combine the runtime with the code and wrap it all in a single executable. E.g. http://www.py2exe.org http://www.py2exe.org does exactly this.