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by binaryturtle 39 days ago
Go, similar to Rust, has a horrible ecosystem, IMHO. I want to like it, but they already broke backwards compatibility with older systems (try to get the Go compiler running on a slightly older OS X, f.ex.), and for a compiler that's a no-go to me.
2 comments
jvanderbot 39 days ago
I regret to inform you, but the post was not about maintaining old systems, it was about simplicity in creating services using a language purpose-designed for creating services. The modern underlying os/docker image was kind of a baked-in assumption.
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binaryturtle 39 days ago
The post was about Go and uses the "The boring choice is the right choice." point at the end. But a compiler that's so quick to abandoned previously perfectly fine supported systems, and basically is bleeding edge, is anything but the "boring right choice". I personally prefer long term stability in the toolchains I use for my projects at least.
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Milpotel 39 days ago
What language/toolchain/platform are you talking about because C/C++/Python/... all have the same issues?
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binaryturtle 35 days ago
Bootstrapping a modern/ up-to-date C/C++ compiler works, getting an up-do-date Python onto the system works too. No such issues with either of those. But try the same with Go or Rust and you hit nasty roadblocks (in both cases the older OS was previously supported just fine.)
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Milpotel 30 days ago
I'm not sure what C/C++ compilers you have in mind but bootstrapping older GCC and LLVM versions on modern systems is far from trivial and typically requires patching (e.g. older LLVM versions do not compile with modern compilers) and pinning a whole ecosystem (cmake, C lib, autotools, ...). The same is true for the other way around, modern C compilers usually do not compile on older systems and you get lucky if you find a round trip of several versions that get you a roughly working compiler at some point.
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asdfasgasdgasdg 39 days ago
Isn't that the same thing that Homebrew does? It only has CI for the last couple of Mac OS X versions. Seems like this is more of an issue with Mac OS X architecture than Go.
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binaryturtle 39 days ago
Dunno about Homebrew (haven't used that since many years for various reasons), but Apple is certainly pushing things in a way that makes 3rd party developers quickly abandon old systems too. That's true. At least lots of 3rd party developers are very quick to give up if their new Xcode will not cooperate.
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