U8String VS Odin

Writing performance-sensitive code in C and calling it via interop used to be the way to go during .NET Framework days but since then has become a performance trap.

Especially for small methods, calling them through interop is a deoptimization because they cannot be inlined, and involve GC frame transition (which you can suppress) as well as an indirect jump and maybe interop stub unless you are statically linking the dependency into your AOT deployment. In case the arguments are not blittable to C - marshalling too.

It is also complicates the publishing process because you have to build both .NET and C parts and then package them together, considering the matrix of [win, linux, macos] x [x64, arm64], it turns into quite an unpleasant experience.

Instead, the recommended approach is just continuing to write C# code, except with pointer and/or ref based code. This is what CoreLib itself does for the most performance-sensitive bits[0]. Naturally, it intentionally looks ugly like in Rust, but you can easily fix it with a few extension methods[1].

[0]: https://github.com/dotnet/runtime/blob/main/src/libraries/Sy...

[1]: https://github.com/U8String/U8String/blob/main/Sources/Share...

This article is about my experience with Odin programming language. So, I won't talk about its features and advantages and provide basic tutorials. There are plenty of materials on those topics.

There's also Odin[0] too. I tried using them all and Odin was pretty nice. Nim is also good too but a lot more features.

But - I concluded that language matters a lot less compared to APIs. Yes, the language should have enough good features to let the programmers express themselves, but overall well designed APIs matter a lot more than language. For example -tossing most of the C stdlib and following a consistent coding style (similar to one described here -[1]), with using Arenas for memory allocation, I can be just as productive in C.

[0] - https://odin-lang.org

I highly recommend looking at:

* The Overview: <https://odin-lang.org/docs/overview/>

* examples/demo: <https://github.com/odin-lang/Odin/blob/master/examples/demo/...>

As for the first example: a basic lexing example is probably boring, but it does show some basic ideas of what the language is about. If people want to write better examples or just reorder the current ones, please feel free to make an issue or PR on the website's GitHub page: <https://github.com/odin-lang/odin-lang.org>.

I use Odin primarily, it’s C-level but pascal/Go syntax and inspiration https://odin-lang.org/

Website: https://odin-lang.org/

Get it from the website: https://odin-lang.org/ -- Odin includes bindings to popular gamedev libraries & APIs such as Raylib, SDL, DirectX, OpenGL and Vulkan.