[geeks] Misuse of Java

[Greg A. Woods]

[ On Wednesday, November 6, 2002 at 17:31:25 (-0500), Joshua D Boyd wrote: ]
> Subject: Re: [geeks] Misuse of Java
>
> Now, I don't have that book, so would you mind telling me, what
> compilers did they use for Java?

I don't know, but the date and the test environments might give a hint:

"The Practice of Programming", Brian W. Kernighan and Rob Pike, 1999,
ISBN 0--201-61586-x (page 81):

The algorithm was a markov chain processor.  The input was the Book of
Psalms from the King James Bible (42,685 words, 5,238 distinct words,
24,482 prefixes).  Apparently they implemented a good C version first,
and then the others.  The results summary table from the text is:

"The times in the following table are the number of seconds for
generating 10,000 words of output; one machine is a 250MHz MIPS R10000
running Irix 6.4 and the other is a 400MHz Pentium II with 128 megabytes
of memory running Windows NT.  Run-time is almost entirely determined by
the input size; generation is very fast by comparison.  The table also
includes the approximate program size in lines of source code.

                 250MHz       400 MHz       Lines of
                 R10000      Pentium II    source code
C                0.36 sec     0.30 sec        150
Java             4.9          9.2             105
C++/STL/deque    2.6         11.2              70
C++/STL/list     1.7          1.5              70
Awk              2.2          2.1              20
Perl             1.8          1.0              18

"The C and C++ versions were compiled with optimizing compilers, while
the Java runs had just-in-time compilers enabled.  The Irix C and C++
times are the fastest obtained from three different compilers; similar
results were observed on Sun SPARC and DEC Alpha machines.  The C
version of the program is fastest by a large factor; Perl comes second.
The times in the table area a snapshot of our experience with a
particular set of compilers and libraries, however, so you may see very
different results in your environment."


Note the above can also be found here:

	http://eris.quintessential.com/users/gypsy/techie_stuff/lang_compare.txt


They also conclue on page 83:

"Production code takes much more effort than prototypes do, howwever.  If
we think of the programs presented here as ``production code'' (since
they have been polished and thoroughly tested), production quality
requires one or two orders of magnitude more effort than a program
intended for personal use."


One of these days I'd like to compare Awk implementations with their
program.  I suspect they used 'nawk', and while it's good, it may not be
the fastest.  I should write a Smalltalk version just for practice too
and then I could compare GNU Smalltalk, Squeak, and other
implemenatations on a similar footing.

-- 
								Greg A. Woods

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