
Crystal 0.31 - ksec
https://crystal-lang.org/2019/09/23/crystal-0.31.0-released.html
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nerdponx
How portable are Crystal binaries? Or more generally, how easy is it to share
a Crystal program with someone who isn't a Crystal user? E.g. C and C++
requires a lot of esoteric knowledge w/ occasionally slow builds, Go isn't
that bad but has an intrusive bad default GOPATH, Rust + Rustup is like Go
with better defaults but relatively long compilation times, Python/Ruby need
the runtime installed + some kind of isolating environment, NodeJS just needs
the runtime + NPM, Perl needs some kind of CPAN setup which is really
confusing for newbies, etc.

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rvz
Like Go, Crystal embeds the runtime inside of the executable by default so it
doesn't require the user to install the language runtime libraries on the
users computer unlike Java, C#, etc.

The only way to get a true portable statically-linked Crystal binary on Linux
is to compile your program statically using an Alpine Linux Docker container.
MacOS portability shouldn't be a problem since everything is static except for
libSystem.dylib.

~~~
pjmlp
Like Java and C# actually, it just doesn't get more known due to the amount of
devs that don't deal with commercial AOT toolchains outside corporations.

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cyberferret
Excited by the constant development of Crystal. Here is hoping that the
various frameworks and shards will keep pace.

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rvz
> Please update your Crystal and report any issues. We will keep moving
> forward and start the development focusing on 0.32.

There is potential in Crystal but the most terrifying thing about using it
right now is the breaking changes.

How often is it that Crystal has to continue to keep doing breaking changes on
every release? Everytime I read a new changelog, I am put off of updating due
to the number of changes required to compile with a new version. There are 8
breaking changes in this release which is enough to put some people off of
learning the language. It is now equivalent to Swift 3 at this point: No
source-compatibility, some initial Windows support and experimental multi-
threading.

Other than this, in terms of its speed and Ruby-like syntax, Crystal
completely blows all other languages out of the ocean. And it is on par with
C/C++/Rust and Zig.

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norswap
It's still in the 0th major version, such changes are expected until 1.0. I
indeed wouldn't recommend using Crystal for anything serious until the
language stabilizes.

I think this is a good strategy if you want to end up with a good core
language with a lot of polish.

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paulcsmith
Totally agree. If this happened post 1.0 I’d be concerned. But pre 1.0 this is
what I’d expect and want. Polish things up because afterward you can’t!

~~~
sjwright
(Or you can and you get the Python 3 debacle for a decade.)

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helaoban
It is supremely annoying that the polygon icon in the top-left of the navbar
does not take me back to the home page, instead it's just a dumb play-thing
that I can drag around with my mouse.

People always judge books by their covers.

edit: that reads in a really nasty tone, imagine that I had instead said
"Unsolicited usability tip, ... " :).

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maxpert
Can't wait for 1.0, shameless plug
[https://gitlab.com/maxpert/crlocator](https://gitlab.com/maxpert/crlocator)
is one of the project's I've been running on prod for over year now.

