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  5. Hack vs Java vs Rust

Hack vs Java vs Rust

OverviewDecisionsComparisonAlternatives

Overview

Java
Java
Stacks148.0K
Followers105.5K
Votes3.7K
Rust
Rust
Stacks6.1K
Followers5.0K
Votes1.2K
GitHub Stars107.6K
Forks13.9K
Hack
Hack
Stacks818
Followers169
Votes29
GitHub Stars18.5K
Forks3.1K

Hack vs Java vs Rust: What are the differences?

Introduction In this comparison, we will discuss the key differences between the programming languages Hack, Java, and Rust.

  1. Type System: Hack is a statically typed language like Java, but it also supports gradual typing, allowing developers to mix dynamically and statically typed code. Java has a strict static type system, whereas Rust is known for its ownership system that guarantees memory safety without the need for a garbage collector.

  2. Memory Management: Java relies on a garbage collector to manage memory, while Rust uses a system of ownership, borrowing, and lifetimes to ensure memory safety at compile time. Hack, being a PHP derivative, does not have the same level of memory management control as Rust but provides more flexibility compared to Java.

  3. Performance: Rust is known for its emphasis on performance, aiming to provide the level of control of a low-level language with the safety of a high-level language. Java relies on a virtual machine for execution, which can introduce some overhead, while Hack, being a dynamically typed language, may not offer the same level of performance optimizations as Rust.

  4. Concurrency: Rust provides safe concurrency by enforcing rules at compile time, thanks to its ownership system. Java offers built-in support for multithreading but can pose challenges with shared mutable state. Hack's concurrency capabilities may be limited compared to Rust and Java due to its dynamic typing nature.

  5. Syntax and Features: Hack, being a PHP derivative, shares similarities with PHP in terms of syntax and features, making it comfortable for PHP developers to transition. Java and Rust have distinct syntaxes with Java focusing on object-oriented programming and Rust incorporating functional programming patterns alongside ownership principles.

  6. Community and Ecosystem: Java has a vast community and rich ecosystem with extensive libraries and frameworks available for various purposes. Rust, though growing rapidly, may not have the same level of mature libraries as Java. Hack, being a relatively newer language, may lack the extensive community support and ecosystem of Java and Rust.

In Summary, Hack, Java, and Rust differ in type systems, memory management, performance, concurrency models, syntax, and community support.

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Advice on Java, Rust, Hack

Erik
Erik

Chief Architect at LiveTiles

May 18, 2020

Decided

C# and .Net were obvious choices for us at LiveTiles given our investment in the Microsoft ecosystem. It enabled us to harness of the .Net framework to build ASP.Net MVC, WebAPI, and Serverless applications very easily. Coupled with the high productivity of Visual Studio, it's the native tongue of Microsoft technology.

614k views614k
Comments
Nick
Nick

Building cool things on the internet 🛠️ at Stream

Sep 5, 2019

Review

I work at Stream and I'm immensely proud of what our team is working on here at the company. Most recently, we announced our Android SDK accompanied by an extensive tutorial for Java and Kotlin. The tutorial covers just about everything you need to know when it comes to using our Android SDK for Stream Chat. The Android SDK touches many features offered by Stream Chat – more specifically, typing status, read state, file uploads, threads, reactions, editing messages, and commands. Head over to https://getstream.io/tutorials/android-chat/ and give it a whirl!

176k views176k
Comments
Ido
Ido

Mar 6, 2020

Decided

When developing a new blockchain, we as a team chose Go lang over Java and other candidates, due to Go being (a) natively suited to concurrency - there are primitives in the language itself (goroutines, channels) that really help with reasoning about concurrency (b) super fast - build time, running, testing are all much faster that Java, this gives a far superior developer experience (c) shorter and stricter than Java - code is much shorter (less verbose), and there is usually one good way to do things, and even the code formatter that is bundled with Go is very opinionated - over a short time this makes reading other people's code far smoother than having to deal with different styles.

You should be aware that Go presently (v1.13) lacks Generics.

267k views267k
Comments

Detailed Comparison

Java
Java
Rust
Rust
Hack
Hack

Java is a programming language and computing platform first released by Sun Microsystems in 1995. There are lots of applications and websites that will not work unless you have Java installed, and more are created every day. Java is fast, secure, and reliable. From laptops to datacenters, game consoles to scientific supercomputers, cell phones to the Internet, Java is everywhere!

Rust is a systems programming language that combines strong compile-time correctness guarantees with fast performance. It improves upon the ideas of other systems languages like C++ by providing guaranteed memory safety (no crashes, no data races) and complete control over the lifecycle of memory.

Hack provides instantaneous type checking via a local server that watches the filesystem. It typically runs in less than 200 milliseconds, making it easy to integrate into your development workflow without introducing a noticeable delay.

--
Fast Development; Type Checking; Built for HHVM; Type Annotations; Generics; Lambdas
Statistics
GitHub Stars
-
GitHub Stars
107.6K
GitHub Stars
18.5K
GitHub Forks
-
GitHub Forks
13.9K
GitHub Forks
3.1K
Stacks
148.0K
Stacks
6.1K
Stacks
818
Followers
105.5K
Followers
5.0K
Followers
169
Votes
3.7K
Votes
1.2K
Votes
29
Pros & Cons
Pros
  • 608
    Great libraries
  • 446
    Widely used
  • 401
    Excellent tooling
  • 396
    Huge amount of documentation available
  • 334
    Large pool of developers available
Cons
  • 33
    Verbosity
  • 27
    NullpointerException
  • 17
    Nightmare to Write
  • 16
    Overcomplexity is praised in community culture
  • 12
    Boiler plate code
Pros
  • 146
    Guaranteed memory safety
  • 133
    Fast
  • 89
    Open source
  • 75
    Minimal runtime
  • 73
    Pattern matching
Cons
  • 28
    Hard to learn
  • 24
    Ownership learning curve
  • 12
    Unfriendly, verbose syntax
  • 4
    High size of builded executable
  • 4
    Variable shadowing
Pros
  • 6
    Open source
  • 6
    Interoperates seamlessly with php
  • 5
    Backed by facebook
  • 4
    HHVM
  • 2
    Generics
Integrations
Spring
Spring
No integrations available
HHVM (HipHop Virtual Machine)
HHVM (HipHop Virtual Machine)

What are some alternatives to Java, Rust, Hack?

JavaScript

JavaScript

JavaScript is most known as the scripting language for Web pages, but used in many non-browser environments as well such as node.js or Apache CouchDB. It is a prototype-based, multi-paradigm scripting language that is dynamic,and supports object-oriented, imperative, and functional programming styles.

Python

Python

Python is a general purpose programming language created by Guido Van Rossum. Python is most praised for its elegant syntax and readable code, if you are just beginning your programming career python suits you best.

PHP

PHP

Fast, flexible and pragmatic, PHP powers everything from your blog to the most popular websites in the world.

Ruby

Ruby

Ruby is a language of careful balance. Its creator, Yukihiro “Matz” Matsumoto, blended parts of his favorite languages (Perl, Smalltalk, Eiffel, Ada, and Lisp) to form a new language that balanced functional programming with imperative programming.

Golang

Golang

Go is expressive, concise, clean, and efficient. Its concurrency mechanisms make it easy to write programs that get the most out of multicore and networked machines, while its novel type system enables flexible and modular program construction. Go compiles quickly to machine code yet has the convenience of garbage collection and the power of run-time reflection. It's a fast, statically typed, compiled language that feels like a dynamically typed, interpreted language.

HTML5

HTML5

HTML5 is a core technology markup language of the Internet used for structuring and presenting content for the World Wide Web. As of October 2014 this is the final and complete fifth revision of the HTML standard of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). The previous version, HTML 4, was standardised in 1997.

C#

C#

C# (pronounced "See Sharp") is a simple, modern, object-oriented, and type-safe programming language. C# has its roots in the C family of languages and will be immediately familiar to C, C++, Java, and JavaScript programmers.

Scala

Scala

Scala is an acronym for “Scalable Language”. This means that Scala grows with you. You can play with it by typing one-line expressions and observing the results. But you can also rely on it for large mission critical systems, as many companies, including Twitter, LinkedIn, or Intel do. To some, Scala feels like a scripting language. Its syntax is concise and low ceremony; its types get out of the way because the compiler can infer them.

Elixir

Elixir

Elixir leverages the Erlang VM, known for running low-latency, distributed and fault-tolerant systems, while also being successfully used in web development and the embedded software domain.

Swift

Swift

Writing code is interactive and fun, the syntax is concise yet expressive, and apps run lightning-fast. Swift is ready for your next iOS and OS X project — or for addition into your current app — because Swift code works side-by-side with Objective-C.

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