[TriLUG] Re: Managed languages (was .NET development on Linux)

[Tanner Lovelace]

Joseph Tate said the following on 6/17/04 12:32 PM:

> My point is that with a managed language you'll get more work done 
> because you won't spend any time tracking these down.  I've got no 
> problems with pointers, and I understand them better than most C++ 
> programmers that I know, but if I don't have to deal with them, I can 
> spend more time on important things, and I pride myself in the minimal 
> number of memory leaks in my code, but even the most experienced 
> programmer misses a free or delete here and there.  These are problems 
> that should be abstracted away except in the most high-performance 
> requirements.  As none of the code that I currently write requires that 
> high performance, for any *new* project, I *will* use something besides 
> C or C++.  Fortran is right out.

My problem with managed languages is that while it is true, in theory,
that using things like garbage collection can make your program
work better, in practice things are often different.  Yes, garbage
collected programs should be just as fast as non-garbage collected
programs, but the truth is that hardly anyone does any optimizations
on garbage collectors.  The majority of them out there just stick
mark and sweep in and think that it will solve all their problems.
And, no garbage collector will work in all circumstances.

Last I heard, you couldn't swap out the garbage collector in most
languages.  So, for myself, I prefer sticking to languages where
I have more control over things.

Cheers,
Tanner