Lets talk about fibers

[via Digitalmars-d]

On Friday, 5 June 2015 at 14:51:05 UTC, Chris wrote:
> I agree, but I dare doubt that a slight performance edge will 
> make the difference. There are load of factors (knowledge base, 
> infrastructure, complacency, C++-Guruism, marketing etc.) why D 
> is an underdog.

But everybody loves the underdog when it catches up to the pack 
and beats the pack on the finish line. ;^)

I now follow Pony because of this self-provided benchmark:

http://ponylang.org/benchmarks_all.pdf

They are communicating a focus for a domain, a good understanding 
of their area, and it makes me want to give it a spin even at 
this early stage where I obviously can't actually use it.

I am not saying Pony is good, but it makes a good case for itself 
IMO.

> no sugar, thanks." I know, as usual I simplify things and 
> exaggerate! He he he. But programming languages are like 
> everything else, only because something is good doesn't mean 
> that people will buy it.

Sure, but it is also important to make people take notice. People 
take notice of benchmark leaders. And too often benchmarks 
measure throughput while latency is just as important.

End user don't notice peak throughput (which is measurable as a 
bleep on the cloud server instance-count logs), they notice 
reduced latency. So to me latency is the most important aspect of 
a web-service (+ programmer productivity).

I don't find Go exciting, but they show concern for latency 
(concurrent GC etc). Communicating that concern is good, even 
before they reach whatever goals they have.

> As regard compiler-based features, as soon as features are 
> compiler-based people will complain "Why is it built-in? That 
> should be handled by a library! I want more freedom!" I know 
> for sure.

Heh, not if it is getting you an edge, but if it is a second 
citizen addition. Yes, then I agree.

Cheers!