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Which Language has Brightest Future in Replacing C — D, Go, or Rust — and Why?

posted by martyb on Friday November 13 2015, @10:24AM   Printer-friendly
from the Obfuscated-Rust-Competition-doesn't-sound-right dept.

Phoenix666 writes:

In spite of my status and obvious bias as co-creator of D, I'll do my best to answer candidly; I follow Go and Rust, and I also definitely know where D's dirty laundry is. I'd encourage people with similar positions in the Rust and Go communities to share their honest opinion as well. So here goes.

First off, C++ needs to be somewhere in the question. Whether it's to be replaced alongside C, or be one of the candidates that's supposed to replace C, the C++ language is a key part of the equation. It's the closest language to C and the obvious step up from it. Given C++'s age, I'll assume in the following that the question also puts C++ alongside with C as a target for replacement.

Each language has a number of fundamental advantages (I call them "10x advantages" because they are qualitatively in a different league compared to at least certain baselines) and a number of challenges. The future of these languages, and their success in supplanting C, depends on how they can use their 10x advantages strategically, and how they overcome their challenges.

[Another way to look at this is to ask "What is wrong with C?" and then assess how well these languages solve those problems. -Ed.]

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  • (Score: 2) by snick on Friday November 13 2015, @02:34PM

    by snick (1408) on Friday November 13 2015, @02:34PM (#262654)

    "What is wrong with C?"
    Ans: lots of code written by programmers who didn't give a thought to security issues and didn't bother with paranoid checking of all input.

    ... uummmm .... how is this different from EVERY OTHER LANGUAGE EVER WRITTEN??!!?!?!?

    If you tell me that modern languages make thought about security issues and paranoid checking of input unnecessary, I'm gonna auto post your reply to the mailing list.

    Starting Score:    1  point
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  
    Total Score:   2  

  • (Score: 2) by theluggage on Friday November 13 2015, @05:19PM

    by theluggage (1797) on Friday November 13 2015, @05:19PM (#262752)

    ... uummmm .... how is this different from EVERY OTHER LANGUAGE EVER WRITTEN??!!?!?!?

    Quantity and type of existing code: not many encryption systems written in COBOL, operating system kernels written in FORTRAN or Pascal networking stacks.

    If you tell me that modern languages make thought about security issues and paranoid checking of input unnecessary, I'm gonna auto post your reply to the mailing list.

    Uh, yes, that was kinda my point. To be fair C (or at least the standard C library) is rather more amenable to buffer overruns and pointer fubars than languages with 'higher level' implementations of references and strings. Of course, what 'ya gonna write your high-level. high performance string library in?

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 13 2015, @05:38PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 13 2015, @05:38PM (#262767)

      Of course, what 'ya gonna write your high-level. high performance string library in?

      Eh, just abstract it away and let someone else deal with it.