Huge output size for simple programs

[Adam D. Ruppe via Digitalmars-d-learn]

On Friday, 11 September 2015 at 11:15:33 UTC, NX wrote:
> hello_world (linux executable) -> 13 MB !!!

Try running `strip yourexecutable` on all compilers, but on gdc 
it should make the biggest difference. It brings debugging info 
and exported symbols.

> Is this because whole GC implementation code is injected into 
> executable or maybe libphobos.a being statically linked or is 
> this because TypeInfo* ModuleInfo* stuff?

Static linking is a couple hundred kilobytes, some of the library 
being intertwined is a couple hundred more.

C's stdlib is also large, but since it comes with the operating 
system preinstalled, you don't think about it much. Ditto times 
twenty for Java, .net, C++, dynamic languages, etc.

Just D's isn't preinstalled so it carries what it needs with the 
executable for broadest compatibility. You could dynamically link 
if you like (`-defaultlib=libphobos2.so` on dmd linux) though 
then to share the application, you've gotta share that 
multi-megabyte .so as well as the executable.... and deal with 
dependency management, so it really makes it worse.

And if you aren't distributing it, meh, what's 400 kb on your own 
hard drive?