OT (partially): about promotion of integers

[SomeDude]

On Thursday, 13 December 2012 at 01:32:23 UTC, bearophile wrote:
> Walter Bright:
>
>> Java makes no attempt to detect integer overflows.
>
> There are various kinds of code. In some kinds of programs you 
> want to be more sure that the result is correct, while other 
> kinds of programs this need is less strong.
>
>
>> I personally know people who write high speed trading 
>> software. These people are concerned with nanosecond delays. 
>> They write code in C++. They even hack on the compiler trying 
>> to get it to generate faster code.
>>
>> It doesn't surprise me a bit that some people who operate 
>> server farms use slow languages like Ruby, Python, and Perl on 
>> them. This does cost them money for extra hardware. There are 
>> always going to be businesses that have inefficient 
>> operations, poorly allocated resources, and who leave a lot of 
>> money on the table.
>
> One "important" firm uses OcaML for high speed trading because 
> it's both very fast (C++-class fast, faster than Java on 
> certain kinds of code, if well used) and apparently quite safer 
> to use than C/C++. And it's harder to find OcaML programmers 
> than C++ ones.
>
> Bye,
> bearophile


According to the Benchmark game, performance of Ocaml is good, 
but not fantstic. And certainly not "C++-class" fast. It's more 
like "Java-class" fast. (in fact it's slower than Java 7 on most 
tests, but uses much more memory).
Unfortunately, D hasn't been on the game for a long time, but 
last time it was, it was effectively faster than g++.

So really, we are not talking the same kind of performance here. 
D is likely to be MUCH faster than Ocaml.