On Wed, 12 Nov 2003, Dustin Sallings wrote:

> On Nov 12, 2003, at 8:14, John J Lee wrote:
[...]
> > I currently use Python by preference, but I'm interested in a language
> > (other than C/C++!) that doesn't depend on a big runtime library and
> > generates "reasonably" small executables -- modems are here to stay
> > for a while yet.
>
> 	The stuff I build on my Mac ends up being about 300k so far.  That
> seems reasonably small to me.

Thanks.  From how many lines of source code?

How big is the "hello world" executable?


> 	I'm not sure what a modem has to do with your distribution, but there

If you're distributing executables over the internet to people who use
modems (ie., most people ;-), download size is important.


> are options.  You could distribute the source to your app (which will
> be way smaller than the equivalent C or C++ application) and compile
> elsewhere, or you can use the transfer time to bask in your
> productivity and performance gains.  :)

Unfortunately, neither is an option.  I want to distribute single
executables (for Windows, anyway).  Actually, another issue: can O'Caml
generate Windows DLLs?  ISTR some issue about that...


> 	Python is a bad reference for two reasons:
>
> 	1) You don't typically distribute compiled python apps (and when you
> do, it's always bytecode).
> 	2) Ocaml's runtime is *amazingly* fast.

Well, bad reference for what purposes?  I don't care whether there's
bytecode, machine code, or lemon jelly in my .exes, as long as they're
small :-)  And I don't need any speed above what Python provides.


> 	I've prototyped a few apps in python before rewriting in ocaml for
> performance.  The speed gains alone are beginning to push python away
> from being my primary utility app language.  I like a lot about the
> language as well.

Great.


John

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