About this video

• Video Title: 🚨🚨 Full Casey Muratori: Language Perf and Picking A Lang Stream 🚨🚨
• Channel: ThePrimeTime
• Speakers: Casey Muratori
• Duration: 1:58:36

Overview

This video features Casey Muratori discussing various programming languages, his personal programming challenges, and critiquing benchmarks. He delves into the difficulties of choosing a new language for the upcoming year, comparing Rust, Go, Zig, and Odin, and touching upon metaprogramming capabilities and the importance of enjoying a language. He also analyzes a controversial benchmark that claims Fortran outperforms modern languages, revealing flaws in its methodology and execution.

Key takeaways

• Language Conundrum: Muratori expresses an "emotional crisis" regarding language selection for the next year, having previously used Rust and Go. He is considering Zig and Odin for their metaprogramming features but is hesitant due to the current state of new language development.
• Critique of Rust: Despite acknowledging its technical merits, Muratori states he doesn't enjoy programming in Rust and would not use it again, emphasizing the importance of personal enjoyment in a language.
• Go's Utility: He finds Go to be a productive language for asynchronous tasks and building services, despite its objective flaws and "footguns."
• Metaprogramming Importance: Muratori highlights metaprogramming as a key feature he seeks in a new language, with Zig and especially Julia (J language) standing out for their robust metaprogramming systems.
• Benchmark Criticism: He extensively critiques a popular benchmark that inaccurately portrays Fortran as significantly faster than other languages like C, Zig, and Odin. Muratori demonstrates how flaws in the benchmark's implementation, including incorrect string handling and lack of proper validation, lead to misleading results.
• Importance of Benchmarking Methodology: He stresses the need for rigorous methodology, validation, and analysis in benchmarking, arguing that poorly constructed benchmarks create misinformation and unfairly impact language maintainers.
• C as a Baseline: Muratori expresses continued appreciation for C, finding it reliable and predictable, and contrasting it with the "Jank" often associated with newer languages and their developing ecosystems.

Muratori states he doesn't enjoy programming in Rust. While he acknowledges that "really nice Rust" code is "really cool" and appreciates what can be done with it, he explicitly says, "I don't want to do it." His decision is not based on technicalities but a lack of personal enjoyment derived from programming in the language. He mentions his experience with Rust over two years and the public reaction to his video about not wanting to program in it again.

While Muratori expresses appreciation for C and finds Go to be a productive language for specific tasks, he doesn't explicitly state a single "favorite" language in this transcript. He is currently in a process of evaluating and deciding on a new language, indicating a desire for a language that excels in metaprogramming and is suitable for future development. He is particularly interested in the metaprogramming capabilities of Julia and Zig, and finds Odin appealing for its simplicity and structure.