Linux Number Crunching: Languages and Tools

ChaoticCoyote writes " You've covered some of my past forays into benchmarking, so I thought Slashdot might be interested in Linux Number Crunching: Benchmarking Compilers and Languages for ia32. I wrote the article while trying to decide between competing technologies. No one benchmark (or set of benchmarks) provides an absolute answer -- but information helps make reasonable decisions. Among the topics covered: C++, Java, Fortran 95, gcc, gcj, Intel compilers, SMP, double-precision math, and hyperthreading."

Comments

JIT?

[EnglishTim]

The article claims that he *is* using a Just-In-Time compiler. What makes you think otherwise?

Re:Java is slow?

[AG]

gcj really is within 10% of g++ on this benchmark, unfortunately he built the gcj program without the all important -ffast-math option (and -funroll-loops). This is a huge penalty for gcj - more than 2x slower without.

I sent him a note and hopefully he's update his page.

Comments by the Author

[ChaoticCoyote]

Almost *ALL* of my email is related to Java. I'll be adding the IBM JDK and older versions of the Sun JDK later today, as per reader request.

I'm making minor updates to the article as the day passes. I appreciate comments from everyone; once I'm through with my e-mail, I'll respond to these Slashdot comments.

Additional benchmarks will be added to the article with time; I'm putting together a single-precision ("float") benchamrk, for example.

I can only try...

[ChaoticCoyote]

...the tools I have at hand. I have nothing against TowerJ, but can't test it if I don't own it. As for Java, I made note of a lack of flags, which is different from complaining. The -O flag is no longer supported by Sun's JDK according to the documentation.

An old policy

[ChaoticCoyote]

Back when I wrote reviews for print magazines (back when there were print magazines, that is), it was standard policy to limit reviews to the actually, shipping, commercial product. Demos often lack critical features (like optimizers) or are tuned for benchmark tests, so I've kept to that policy now that I write reviews for my own web site.

I own licenses for the Intel compilers, for example -- and, of course, gcc and Sun Java don't cost anything in the first place. I'm considering my options in this case; long gone are the days when a dozen Fortran or C compilers would arrive at my door for a magazine review. Heck, there aren't a dozen compiler vendors left... ;)