Slashdot Mirror
Performance Benchmarks of Nine Languages
ikewillis writes "OSnews compares the relative performance of nine languages and variants on Windows: Java 1.3.1, Java 1.4.2, C compiled with gcc 3.3.1, Python 2.3.2, Python compiled with Psyco 1.1.1, Visual Basic, Visual C#, Visual C++, and Visual J#. His conclusion was that Visual C++ was the winner, but in most of the benchmarks Java 1.4 performed on par with native code, even surpassing gcc 3.3.1's performance. I conducted my own tests pitting Java 1.4 against gcc 3.3 and icc 8.0 using his benchmark code, and found Java to perform significantly worse than C on Linux/Athlon."
Don't forget about the Win32 Compiler Shootout
Because the guy who wrote the code decided to use the VB6 compatability features instead of the .NET runtime for VB. Why one would do this, I have no idea.
If more people would use the SWT libraries (part of the Eclipse project) instead of the crappy AWT/Swing libraries, then this misconception would go away. SWT works by mapping everything to native OS widgets if possible, giving it the look, feel, and speed of a native app. I used Eclipse for quite a while before finding out that it is almost 100% pure Java (other than the JNI code necessary for the native calls).
Site was showing signs of Slashdotting, so I'll quote one of the more important sections...
Results
Here are the benchmark results presented in both table and graph form. The Python and Python/Psyco results are excluded from the graph since the large numbers throw off the graph's scale and render the other results illegible. All scores are given in seconds; lower is better.
int long double trig I/O TOTAL
Visual C++ 9.6 18.8 6.4 3.5 10.5 48.8
Visual C# 9.7 23.9 17.7 4.1 9.9 65.3
gcc C 9.8 28.8 9.5 14.9 10.0 73.0
Visual Basic 9.8 23.7 17.7 4.1 30.7 85.9
Visual J# 9.6 23.9 17.5 4.2 35.1 90.4
Java 1.3.1 14.5 29.6 19.0 22.1 12.3 97.6
Java 1.4.2 9.3 20.2 6.5 57.1 10.1 103.1
Python/Psyco 29.7 615.4 100.4 13.1 10.5 769.1
Python 322.4 891.9 405.7 47.1 11.9 1679.0
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
The Pentium trig instructions are not IEEE compliant (they don't return the correct values for large magnitude arguments). gcc errs on the side of caution and generates slow, software-based wrappers that correct for the limitations of the Pentium instructions by default. Other compilers (e.g., Intel and probably Microsoft) just generate the in-line instructions with no correction. When you look at the claimed superiority of other compilers over gcc, it is usually such tradeoffs that make gcc appear slower.
You can enable inline trig functions in gcc as well, either with a command line flag, or an include file, or by using "asm" statements on a case-by-case basis. Check the documentation. With those enabled, gcc keeps up well with other compilers on trig functions.