Re: startup times

[Neil W. Van Dyke]

> The new guile is fast even without all the fancy compilers and jit code
> generation.

Unfortunately, the startup time when using GOOPS and other modules
is not nearly as fast as comparable Perl.  This is a usability
problem for Guile shell scripts that are invoked interactively,
and for applications (like my current Internet agent one) that have
reason to exec many short-lived processes running Guile interpreters.

I'd rather not have to use workarounds to have a faster-loading
Guile.  I really like the Free Software *accessibility* of loading
from the source files, such that any programmer (budding or expert)
can always easily see what code is running and easily extend it
without having to jump through build and execution environment
hoops.  If the generic interpreter program is fast enough that we
don't need a performance workarounds (special interpreter, native
code, fat modules, etc.), that makes the source much more accessible
to modification.

> Give the cvs guile a try.

I'm using a month-old CVS version (due to connectivity problems and
Autoconf 2.5).  Have there been performance improvements since?

-- 
Neil W. Van Dyke <address@hidden>
http://www.neilvandyke.org/