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Pony: An actor-model, capabilities-secure, high-performance programming language

ponylang.io

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Re: Pony: An actor-model, capabilities-secure, high-performance programming language

#31

Post by notfed »

Timwi wrote: post #17
voidUpdate wrote: post #3

I wish these language websites would put an example of some code right there on the homepage so I can see what the language "feels" like. I finally found some code in the tutorials https://tutorial.ponylang.io/getting-started/hello-world

Honestly, I get it. The document wants to tell you what's new and different under the hood, not what the language looks like superficially. Code examples don't actually tell you what the language feels like in production. It's kinda like judging a person's character by how they dress. I would be torn if I had to write intro documentation like this. On the one hand, people demand code examples, but on the other hand,…

> people reading code examples will nitpick minor pet peeves in the syntax and completely detract from the actual news ideas and concepts

Err, ok, so? Don't be so afraid of criticism, I guess? Yeah, some people will nitpick. I don't see the problem.

Re: Pony: An actor-model, capabilities-secure, high-performance programming language

#33

Post by chownie »

jibal wrote: post #23
teiferer wrote: post #7

I gave it an honest look for 5 minutes and after still only having found a 3-line hello world I gave up (and came here to complain). It's great that you have all that philosophy behind it, all sounded great, but if you don't show me a compelling example in the first minute or two, not even in tutorial, then you'll fail to capture my interest.

dang recently pointed me to the HN guidelines. I think this one applies here: "Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something."

This is by definition a critical comment which teaches something, ie if you don't present viewers with pertinent information about your project, they cannot take an interest in your project. I think it should be noted that both GP and another few highly rated comments are making this exact point.

Re: Pony: An actor-model, capabilities-secure, high-performance programming language

#34

Post by klas_segeljakt »

jibal wrote: post #20
voidUpdate wrote: post #3

I wish these language websites would put an example of some code right there on the homepage so I can see what the language "feels" like. I finally found some code in the tutorials https://tutorial.ponylang.io/getting-started/hello-world

The syntax is the least interesting thing about the language, and hello-world examples demonstrate almost none of the syntax. This bit from the About page is notable: "never write a programming language. That’s like rule #1. Everybody will just tell you it isn’t needed and then argue about syntax."

It's not only about showing off syntax. It's also about showing what type of applications the language makes easy to implement.

Re: Pony: An actor-model, capabilities-secure, high-performance programming language

#35

Post by jibal »

chownie wrote: post #33
jibal wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

dang recently pointed me to the HN guidelines. I think this one applies here: "Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something."

This is by definition a critical comment which teaches something, ie if you don't present viewers with pertinent information about your project, they cannot take an interest in your project. I think it should be noted that both GP and another few highly rated comments are making this exact point.

"by definition"? It's apparently something you believe, but it certainly isn't a tautology. And I don't think that's an accurate characterization of that comment, at all.

Re: Pony: An actor-model, capabilities-secure, high-performance programming language

#36

Post by adwn »

> The standard way to avoid these problems is to use locks to prevent data updates from happening at the same time. This causes big performance hits […]

No. Modern mutex implementations [1] are extremely efficient, require only 1 byte of memory (no heap allocation), and are almost free when there's no contention on the lock – certainly much faster and much lower latency than sending messages between actors.

[1] Like the parking_lot crate for Rust.

Re: Pony: An actor-model, capabilities-secure, high-performance programming language

#37

Post by jibal »

klas_segeljakt wrote: post #34
jibal wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The syntax is the least interesting thing about the language, and hello-world examples demonstrate almost none of the syntax. This bit from the About page is notable: "never write a programming language. That’s like rule #1. Everybody will just tell you it isn’t needed and then argue about syntax."

It's not only about showing off syntax. It's also about showing what type of applications the language makes easy to implement.

But that's not what was asked for. To find that out, one must dig fairly deeply into the documentation ... at least read the About page.

Re: Pony: An actor-model, capabilities-secure, high-performance programming language

#38

Post by pjmlp »

delifue wrote: post #16

The difference between Pony and Rust is that Pony allows easy reference cycle. One of the innovative point of Pony is the iso reference. iso reference means that an object graph is accessible from only that iso reference. It avoids sharing mutable data.

And that it has a nice garbage collector, which is good enough due to the way capabilities work, being per actor, and how references work.

Re: Pony: An actor-model, capabilities-secure, high-performance programming language

#39

Post by nallerooth »

voidUpdate wrote: post #3

I wish these language websites would put an example of some code right there on the homepage so I can see what the language "feels" like. I finally found some code in the tutorials https://tutorial.ponylang.io/getting-started/hello-world

I think Nim has a good homepage, with some bullet points explaining what the language is all about coupled with several code examples. I'm not saying Nim is better, but I visited the page the other day and thought it was neat.

https://nim-lang.org/

Re: Pony: An actor-model, capabilities-secure, high-performance programming language

#40

Post by burnt-resistor »

codethief wrote: post #14
burnt-resistor wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. A "try language" demo should dive right into an editable executor with syntax highlighting and API-docs floating tool tip code completion. Make it as painless and fast to understand as possible.

You mean this executor[0] which is linked right there on the page we are discussing here? [0]: http://playground.ponylang.io/

That's not the home page and that's not what I'm talking about if you had bother to have read what I wrote that differs from a conventional and limited "try" playground. Also, I've used Pony before and gave up on it.

You also don't get to be the chief decider of what all of us may or may not talk about.

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