Walter's DConf 2014 Talks - Topics in Finance

[Daniel Davidson]

On Saturday, 22 March 2014 at 13:36:01 UTC, Saurabh Das wrote:
> The edge for D in our case comes from 3 factors -
>
> 1. A lot of statistical data from older C++ systems means 
> better assumptions and decisions in the new D system; and
>

But, clearly that is not necessarily a benefit of D. It is a 
benefit of prior experience and the learning curve. If you said, 
we use our data to not only make better assumptions/decisions, 
but to do things in D that can not be done in C++ - then you make 
a very strong case.

> 2. 20% of the system is latency-critical and 80% is not. D 
> allows us to quickly finish 80% and really concentrate on the 
> critical 20%. I must also comment upon how much more productive 
> it is to write a new system in D as compared with C++ - gives 
> us more time to think about the actual problem than try to jump 
> through the C++ hoops.
>

Productivity is very important and can mean big $$ for most 
firms. But if latency is the critical factor in an all-or-nothing 
game, then it is much less so. Maybe your game is different and 
you have edge beyond low latency. I hope that is the case.

> 3. A much better type system - some checks can be moved to 
> compile time. Major benefit.
>

What is a simple example of something that could be done with D 
but not C++ that has nothing to do with building things with less 
developer time?

For example, I could see technical reasons why in certain 
non-quant areas like XML parsing where D can be faster than C++. 
(http://dotnot.org/blog/archives/2008/03/12/why-is-dtango-so-fast-at-parsing-xml/) 
But then, with a large amount of time and unlimited funding the 
techniques could probably be duplicated in C++.

Again, I don't think it is necessary to have any/many cases where 
D beats C++ hands down in performance for its adoption to widen. 
But to push D to a wider audience by focusing on areas where the 
bar is already super high is tough. If I had money to invest in D 
I would invest it in vibe rather than quant because the relative 
advantages of D are so much higher.

> Yes - R, Matlab et all won't be replaced by D most likely. 
> Let's wait and watch. However I disagree about the 
> HFT/low-latency side. Ofcourse there's no way to say for sure. 
> Let's check again in a year :)

Sounds good - keep us posted!

Thanks
Dan