[Info-vax] Safer programming languages (and walking :-) ), was: Re: 8-bit characters

[Arne Vajhøj]

On 11/16/2021 1:54 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
> On 2021-11-15, Arne Vajhøj <arne at vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>> On 11/15/2021 1:51 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>> On 2021-11-14, Arne Vajhøj <arne at vajhoej.dk> wrote:
>>>> On 11/14/2021 5:05 PM, Simon Clubley wrote:
>>>>> On 2021-11-14, Dave Froble <davef at tsoft-inc.com> wrote:
>>>>>> One really doesn't need a language or compiler to get in the way of what needs
>>>>>> to be done.
>>>>>
>>>>> There is a move towards more safe languages for systems programming.
>>>>>
>>>>> The current fashion, Rust, has horrible syntax, and I have no confidence
>>>>> that code written in it today will still compile on the Rust compilers
>>>>> of 5 to 10 years from now, but its use is being driven by the desire
>>>>> for using safer languages.
>>>>>
>>>>> When Rust falls out of fashion, it would be nice if whatever follows
>>>>> Rust would address both of those problems.
>>>>
>>>> Rust seems to be getting some traction.
>>>>
>>>
>>> Unfortunately so. I like the concepts and desire to move to safer
>>> languages but I find the Rust syntax itself ugly. People seem to
>>> have forgotten that you write the code once (hopefully!) but then
>>> read it many times.
>>
>> What do you think about Go?
> 
> It doesn't seem to be a language designed for writing bare metal code
> or operating systems in general so I have not really used it.

It was designed for servers.

But people are using it for small stuff.

Examples:

https://tinygo.org/

https://golangexample.com/a-go-unikernel-running-on-x86-bare-metal/

> On a non-technical level, given how Google treats its projects, I would
> also worry that suddenly one day Go would no longer be supported by Google.

Not likely. It has gotten so much traction that it would
be very difficult to stop it.

Docker, Kubernetes and OpenShift are all written in Go. In 5 years then
75% of the worlds server computing will be run in Kubernetes clusters.

Amazon, Microsoft, Google themselves, IBM/Redhat, VMWare etc. all
need that stuff.

Arne