On 19/09/2013 17:58, Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:
On 9/19/13 1:25 AM, Russel Winder wrote:
Java is no longer under-performant compared to C, C++, Fortran, D, Go,
Rust. Check the benchmarks.
Hmmm, this is not established wisdom and the glib "check the benchmarks"
doesn't quite help.
Java has gotten on par with C and C++ for raw performance of "straight"
code (numerics, I/O etc). I've seen such. Java seems to have issues
involving layout control, which is an important influencer of
performance in computing nowadays.
Clearly the Java community has amassed a nice bag of tricks regarding
performance optimization (parallel arrays, hoisting allocations, etc)
but systems compilers and techniques have also made solid progress. When
it comes to getting "all" performance, the C model is where it's at.
Andrei
I was about to say something similar. Java is no longer under-performant
to C/C++, etc., for a *certain* class of applications only. Applications
that mainly do data manipulation, I/O, etc., because the JIT will
(eventually) compile the Java bytecode to native code.
So Java really is not behind because of being VM-based instead of fully
native-based.
Generally though, I would still say Java is under-performant compared to
C/C++, etc., although I would say it's mainly due to lack of optional
manual memory management. Or lack of value-types (which in a way, are a
form of memory management).
I didn't think layout control would be a major issue, except for a very
specific type of applications, no? That seems like a very low level
optimization.
--
Bruno Medeiros - Software Engineer
