Google may be considering Swift as a ‘first class’ language for Android • Hacker News Board

Re: Google may be considering Swift as a ‘first class’ language for Android

#11

Post by drivingmenuts » Fri, Apr 08, 2016, 2:58 PM UTC

seren wrote: post #3

wrg wrote: post #2

Why not Rust or Go? The only reason they would pick Swift is because of existing uptake

To entice IOS developers to port their app on Android more easily ?

Won't that require that Google finds some way to get people to actually pay for apps comparable to the rate that IOS users pay for theirs?

Re: Google may be considering Swift as a ‘first class’ language for Android

#12

Post by ungzd » Fri, Apr 08, 2016, 3:03 PM UTC

It will be huge fail for Google. Developers will have to think all time about zigahipstomorphic prepomorphisms, monad transformers and other FP voodoo instead of thinking about how to disrupt the world with new innovative sharing economy mobile chat. Real developers are not nerds, they are innovators and businessmen. Only outsiders are doing mental masturbation with all that monadic stuff.

I'd prefer Go, Dart, C, or, better, PHP. It's not as fast as Go, but even more pragmatic, which is more important. Phones are fast nowadays.

Re: Google may be considering Swift as a ‘first class’ language for Android

#13

Post by hga » Fri, Apr 08, 2016, 3:10 PM UTC

wrg wrote: post #4

seren wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To entice IOS developers to port their app on Android more easily ?

This also. It seems purely like a calculated move to undermine iOS as much as possible, but it does make you wonder if it's the Right Thing to do. There are better languages out there that have had much more development take place. And it's not like Google have commit rights or control over Swift. It's sad how they haven't really learned from the Oracle case.

It seems purely like a calculated move to undermine iOS as much as possible

What's your theory behind that?

The only one I can think of is that if they make it easy to write an app for both, and Apple does not accept the app or an update, you haven't suffered a complete loss.

Re: Google may be considering Swift as a ‘first class’ language for Android

#14

Post by takno » Fri, Apr 08, 2016, 3:24 PM UTC

Seems phenomenally improbable. It would basically require a ground-up rewrite of the entire app layer of Java just so that lazy iOS developers can do an even more half assed job of porting their apps over.

Re: Google may be considering Swift as a ‘first class’ language for Android

#15

Post by koder2016 » Fri, Apr 08, 2016, 4:00 PM UTC

Won't help performance, that's for sure. Anyway, the post doesn't mention Dart, so has no credibility whatsoever.

Re: Google may be considering Swift as a ‘first class’ language for Android

#16

Post by convivialdingo » Fri, Apr 08, 2016, 5:03 PM UTC

wrg wrote: post #2

Why not Rust or Go? The only reason they would pick Swift is because of existing uptake

Rust is still being designed and Go doesn't have a mature optimizing compiler.

Swift has a lot of developer growth, cross-platform library possibilities, and a two optimization pass compiler (SIL and IL).

Re: Google may be considering Swift as a ‘first class’ language for Android

#17

Post by Someone » Fri, Apr 08, 2016, 5:32 PM UTC

convivialdingo wrote: post #16

wrg wrote: post #2

Why not Rust or Go? The only reason they would pick Swift is because of existing uptake

Rust is still being designed and Go doesn't have a mature optimizing compiler. Swift has a lot of developer growth, cross-platform library possibilities, and a two optimization pass compiler (SIL and IL).

Swift doesn't have a mature compiler, either. It isn't old enough to have fought enough battles.

Also, I wouldn't say the rust language definition is less stable than Swift's, which is still very much in flux (with changes such as the removal of C-style for loops in the pipeline or just released)

Also, Swift doesn't do garbage collection. That may cause problems when trying to build a shared GUI famework.

Re: Google may be considering Swift as a ‘first class’ language for Android

#18

Post by xori » Fri, Apr 08, 2016, 6:05 PM UTC

koder2016 wrote: post #15

Won't help performance, that's for sure. Anyway, the post doesn't mention Dart, so has no credibility whatsoever.

I'm still surprised that Google hasn't been pushing Dart harder than it has.

Re: Google may be considering Swift as a ‘first class’ language for Android

#19

Post by kagia » Fri, Apr 08, 2016, 6:21 PM UTC

This article should be taken with a good pinch of salt. It seems to be more speculation than anything else...

Re: Google may be considering Swift as a ‘first class’ language for Android

#20

Post by nostrademons » Fri, Apr 08, 2016, 6:50 PM UTC

drivingmenuts wrote: post #11

seren wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To entice IOS developers to port their app on Android more easily ?

Won't that require that Google finds some way to get people to actually pay for apps comparable to the rate that IOS users pay for theirs?

The economic calculus is "cost of porting" < "Android userbase" * "Android conversion rate" * price. iOS stats don't figure into that at all; any money from an Android version is strictly marginal revenue. This change is aimed at significantly reducing the cost of porting; Google probably figures that number is a lot easier to move than the Android conversion rate or price, and they've already made significant progress on increasing the Android userbase.