[WhereIsTheTruth]

Could be a fun python alternative

Questions:

- value/object semantic: i peeked at some code, and i can't tell what is a value, and what is a reference type, is everything heap allocated?

- tooling: what's the state of their language server? does it work with all of their language features?

- debugging: does gdb/lldb understand nim's types and slices?

And finally: is a no-gc mode available?

I'll play with it later today, it's always been in my todo list of languages to try, now is the perfect time

[arc619]

Reference semantics are part of the type.

So "var i: int" is value, "var i: ref int" is a heap allocated reference that's deterministically managed like a borrow checked smart pointer, eliding reference counting if possible.

You can turn off GC or use a different GC, but some of the stdlib uses them, so you'd need to avoid those or write/use alternatives.

Let me say though, the GC is realtime capable and not stop the world. It's not like Java, it's not far off Rust without the hassle.

[janAkali]

1. Nim uses 'var' modifier to pass by reference, e.g. "proc (n: var int)...", default behaviour is pass by value. And there're also raw pointers and references (safe pointers).

>is a no-gc mode available?

You can disable gc, but most of standard library depends on it. But in Nim 2.0 there's finally support for ARC and ORC (ARC + cycle collector).

[ElegantBeef]

> default behaviour is pass by value

Is not exactly true, smaller than 24 bytes is passed by value, the compiler optimizes larger calls and passes by reference implicitly.

[msk-lywenn]

I've been searching and can't find it: A in ARC is for automatic, what does the O stand for?

[dinHeld]

O is a visual pun because it adds a cycle collector to ARC.

[lambertsimnel]

I assumed the O was for "optimised", but apparently it stands for "cycle":

https://nim-lang.org/blog/2020/12/08/introducing-orc.html

[xigoi]

> i can't tell what is a value

If a type is declared with 'ref', it's a reference type. Otherwise, it's a value type.