On Sun, Feb 26, 2017 at 12:45 PM Éric Jacoboni <eric.jacob...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Are you sure? When i write age := 20, i don't play with memory index... > So, i have to write age := int32(20) or var age int32 = 20, which is > rather boring, imho. > > > > It is a trade-off in which you have a couple of options to choose from. Go picked a 64bit integer. Other options include picking a "bigint" with no bounds at all, or picking a 32bit integer. All of those options have situations where they are good choices, and situations where they aren't so. Most code is not sensitive to something like integer division because most code is not sensitive to CPU or Memory bounds nowadays (the machines are simply too fast). On the other hand, a 32bit value regularly runs into size constraints because 2 billion tends to be a fairly small number (the machines are simply too large). Haskell and Erlang defaults to the "bigint" solution. This is not without troubles either. While it removes problems with integer overflows completely from the language, many external data formats have limits at the 32bit or 64bit boundary, and you need to be careful when you start dumping data. JSON, a widely popular format, has its limit at 53 bits, which creates its own slew of practical problems. Also, fast Haskell code requires you to be careful about this and tell the system, via types, what size you want. Fast Erlang code doesn't really exist, and you tend to write those parts in another language next to it. OCaml choses 31bit and 63bit integers respectively. This allows you to easily tag integers so they are distinguishable from pointers in the GC. In turn, parametric polymorhpism becomes easier to implement without the need to whole-program-compile. It also makes integer operations slower since you have to operate on tagged representations. For a modern language, I think Go is doing the right thing. 64bit integers are large enough that it pushes the boundary for error outwards while retaining good speed. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "golang-nuts" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to golang-nuts+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
