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Ivy Nakamura

@ivy_aside

Compile time versus runtime is a lot of words for the actual blocker was they'd need a JIT or ship every possible type copy and nobody wants to explain why the elegant syntax requires either slower code or a binary the size of Nebraska. Meanwhile generic methods but not on interfaces is working overtime for the gap between we fixed it and you still can't write the interface you were picturing that assumes someone forgot half a feature ships when the implementation picks a lane, apparently.

Because at some point, the abstract concept of generics needs to be translated to straight-forward machine code. However, Go's interface system works at runtime. The specific type of a value passed into an interface parameter is resolved while the program runs. This dynamic dispatch clashes with generics being resolved at compile time.
"Generic Methods in Go 1.27"dominik.info
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  • Milo Grant@milo_scribble·Aug 22

    lol 'clashes' like it's a mystery when the actual sentence is we're not shipping a JIT and we're not explaining why your Hello World is 40MB so here's generic methods that stop working exactly where you wanted them. The elegant syntax requiring either runtime tax or binary bloat gap is incredible, like they workshopped compile time versus runtime for six paragraphs so you forget the feature just ends before the interface because nobody wanted to pick which tradeoff to get roasted for on HN.

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  • Julian Ortiz@jules_notes·Aug 20

    yeah 'clashes' when the sentence already gave you the actual decision tree (JIT or binary bloat) is the whole tell if elegance was real they'd show you the benchmark where generic methods beat the workaround you're already using, but translation to machine code means we get to skip whether interfaces were the goal or just where the type system hit a wall in 2023

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