From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: weis Received: (from weis@localhost) by pauillac.inria.fr (8.7.6/8.7.3) id SAA27215 for caml-redist; Tue, 25 Apr 2000 18:58:13 +0200 (MET DST) Received: from concorde.inria.fr (concorde.inria.fr [192.93.2.39]) by pauillac.inria.fr (8.7.6/8.7.3) with ESMTP id VAA32734 for ; Fri, 21 Apr 2000 21:19:00 +0200 (MET DST) Received: from localhost.localdomain (ike49.zip.com.au [210.23.146.49]) by concorde.inria.fr (8.8.7/8.8.7) with ESMTP id VAA03419 for ; Fri, 21 Apr 2000 21:18:57 +0200 (MET DST) Received: from maxtal.com.au (IDENT:root@localhost [127.0.0.1]) by localhost.localdomain (8.9.3/8.8.7) with ESMTP id FAA16148; Sat, 22 Apr 2000 05:18:55 +1000 Sender: weis Message-ID: <3900A99F.FBABF0F4@maxtal.com.au> Date: Sat, 22 Apr 2000 05:18:55 +1000 From: John Max Skaller X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.7 [en] (X11; I; Linux 2.2.12-20 i686) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Markus Mottl CC: Brian Rogoff , OCAML Subject: Re: When functional languages can be accepted by industry? References: <200004201640.SAA05607@miss.wu-wien.ac.at> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Markus Mottl wrote: > Programs on modern architectures depend so heavily on cache behaviour that > performance claims for code-bloating techniques seem to be rather > suspicious. I'd also like to see substantial benchmarks that prove the > merits... Code bloat can be expensive, however so can boxed values. > Considering the improvements on the hardware side in terms of processor > performance, 10% seems very insignificant to me Sure it does. But you are not thinking rationally. You're thinking emotionally. So try this: in doing your job, you find a 10% productivity improvement. Not much eh? Try _over_ an extra months holiday! Are you kidding 10% isn't significant? > Correctness, maintainability and portability are (well, should be) the > primary concerns in a world that changes fast - not "fast" programs... It is for those who commission and pay for the code to determine what their strategic goals are. We have code written in _assembler_. > If your employer says that you should switch to lower-level, unsafe > programming languages to get 10% more performance, tell him that he > should rather buy new hardware (if you dare to! ;-) My employer isn't the user of the software but the puveryor of it. > If he doesn't want, present him an estimate of the costs of more errors... At present, the cost of C++ errors is much lower. That is because the company employs a lot of expert C++ programmers. And only one, nonexpert, ocaml programmer. -- John (Max) Skaller, mailto:skaller@maxtal.com.au 10/1 Toxteth Rd Glebe NSW 2037 Australia voice: 61-2-9660-0850 checkout Vyper http://Vyper.sourceforge.net download Interscript http://Interscript.sourceforge.net