Wow. Some Haskell hackers have started paying a small bit of attention to the Great Computer Language Shootout site, and the results are impressive.
Haskell now takes first place in the lines of code competition. In the CPU time competition, Haskell is also doing quite respectably: it beats out OCaml by a small margin, and defeats Java, C++, Python, Perl, Erlang, Ruby, Mono, Tcl, etc. by significant margins.
These links are all using the Shootout default weightings for individual tests.
The only downside to the Shootout is that the programs — for all languages — are not really idomatic and don’t show off a language’s natural beauty. Sounds like it’s time to gather up some Haskell hackers to rally around the PLEAC effort as well.
Well, not to dampen anyone’s spirits, but GHC-6.4.1 slips to position #7 in the speed department with the other shootout configuration. Looks the the differences between the two setups include…
Still, not a bad showing for a language that is so new and radically different from everything else. Particularly good considering the tests often seem to favor a more imperative approach, IMHO.
“Some Haskell hackers have started paying a small bit of attention”
Watching experienced Haskell programmers optimize programs is fascinating but also a little worrisome. It’s wonderful that experts can make GHC perform but surprising that a non-expert can write simplistic Clean programs that perform a little better.
(As a non-expert the problem with Clean is grappling with uniqueness typing to write anything more than a simple program!)