This is not always true. Static linking with other language doesn't always have similar experience with Go. One of these is the compilation speed. With other languages you'll still have time to get a coffee break before its done.:)
>Turbo Pascal compilation speed, in MS-DOS, using 90’s hardware was already faster than Go.
What relevance does this have on the compiler landscape today ?
If you have to use a compiler from ~30 years ago to find a comparison supporting your claim, it sounds very much like Go is indeed much faster than what it competes against today.
The relevance is that a compiler running in 90's hardware is able to beat Go's compilation speeds of 2017. That same compiler has evolved through the years.
If you want the 2017 version of it, it is called Delphi. Beats Go in language features and compilation speed.
Go's compilation speed only surprises those developers that never used anything else beyond C and C++.
> And beat 99% of other compilers today, meaning that overall compiler complexity has grown.
Which ones?
> For me (tm), Go compilation speed has compared equal or favorably against C, C++, Java, C#, Rust at least.
Since when does Go compile faster than Java and C#?
When I hit Ctrl+S my binary is already on the disk, thanks to incremental compiler integration on the IDE.
I have a full blown WPF application with multiple plugins, including data visualization, talking to Oracle and Postgres, total compilation time after check out 12s.
Eiffel, D, Nim, Jai are other fast compilation examples.
In any case it doesn't change the fact that Go's compilation speed is nothing to brag about, it has been done before in many other languages, Turbo Pascal was just one example.
If you wish I can provide other examples of languages that compile as fast, on such old hardware while matching Go's compilation speed, with richer language features.
It was already too late that MS embrace opensource and made their IDE(Visual Studio) for free. Developers who can't afford it already moved on and used free and opensource alternatives and then start to love it without looking back at MS stuff. They then realize that MS technologies are not the only cool tools and programming languages to write applications with and make money.
I reckon this is where its going. It will allow for a local cloud. Need M*SQL, Elastic, Redis, etc? Run it in a container. The PC is powerful enough to do it.
If HHVM(Hack) will drop all the inconsistencies and weirdness of PHP in their implementation the better since it's no longer be compatible with PHP anyway.
That's the plan. Break the old nonsense, like the one they mentioned: refs and refcount. Everybody should switch to Hack, it's a much better and safer language.
