“Google’s Chrome OS does not run local applications or store local data. Everything is handled inside the browser. But when the much-hyped operating system debuts on netbooks at the end of next year, you can bet it will execute native code on behalf of online Google applications such as Gmail or Docs and Spreadsheets. In other words, Google apps will tap directly into the netbook’s processor in an effort to close the performance gap that separates them from the local software offered by its bete noire, Steve Ballmer’s Microsoft. And this being Google, they won’t use Java, Flash, or Silverlight.”
This fall, Google also unveiled a new programming language it calls Go, … The company has since said it plans to integrate the language with Native Client. … “We have an embryonic implementation of the NaCl support for Go,… It’s restricted by a couple of details of NaCl’s implementation, but we hope to see changes to NaCl one day that will make Go a full-fledged language in that environment.”
Now you can see why Go favours fast compilation. If you can develop code with Go and deliver it to the browser, it can compile it quickly to the processor, avoiding an x86 dependence / monopoly on the web.
All very clever, good stuff.
I for one, don’t like Go syntax at all.
But lets see how this one evolves.
I agree. I refuse to use Go until the fix the absolutely terrible syntax and add generics.
Go has a great, logical syntax from what I’ve read.
OTOH, people’s refusal to work with something because of knee-jerk reaction related to some small nit is what separates people who get work done, and people who stand in the sidelines waiting for the messiah to come (probably in form of Lisp), never actually doing anything.
Python has significant whitespace? Go has no generics? Qt signals are not typesafe? C++ has no closures???
Because … sometimes it is not about just “small nits” 🙂
http://www.xent.com/pipermail/fork/Week-of-Mon-20091109/054578.html
Since it’s apparently not a massive undertaking to implement all of his desires perhaps he should do it himself rather than whine.
Pffft. I started with COBOL, BASIC, FORTRAN, ASSEMBLY LANGUAGE, etc. To me these JIT compiled and hybrid interpretive languages are wonderful… even if their syntax is quirky and you can’t write a web server in under 5 lines.
What the hell do programmers want these days, are they all becoming crying babies? Need their diapers changed and their faces wiped with a bib?
Jeesh! I learned to program BEFORE I went to college for it. If kids today cannot figure out something like python then maybe our school systems are failing them, or they had too much lead in their diets as children.
Logical doesn’t always mean pleasant to work with. LISP and it’s spin-offs such as Scheme are logical too, but that has to be some of the most ridiculous syntax I’ve ever dealt with. It’s logical, it makes sense, I get it… and I still hate it.
Really? Where did you read that? I can’t think of a single modern language with worse syntax (e.g. Fortran and COBOL don’t count). I actually think that the majority of languages I have used have at least reasonable syntax. I love Python and its indentation, and C++ is complicated but logical.
This is very true. No language can please everyone. But there are still many languages that do thing very well (my personal favorites are Python, C++, C#, JavaScript, and Lua, even though there are things I don’t like about all of them).
It just happens to annoy me when a new language like Go is invented and they leave out extremely useful feature like generics. And it isn’t a show-stopper. If Go had reasonable syntax but still no generics, I probably would use it. It just seems odd that a language like Go which is designed to maximize programmer productivity would leave out things like generics.
signed
also, page 2 wtf
NaCl does not compile anything at the browser end. Code is compiled once, then just verified by the browser.
Compiling Go code in the browser might be an interesting approach, but it would not have anything to do with Native Client, unless I missed something.
Great writing The Register. You had to use Sodium Chloride (NaCl) or Salt to be your acronym for Native Client?
It’s a joke. And Google, not The Register, came up with it.
Yeah, Google it. LOL!