Why Erlang is the best concurrent language available

[Shawn Pearce]

James Hague <jamesh@REDACTED> wrote:
> Joe Armstrong wrote:
> >My philosophy is  "write as *beautiful* code as
> >possible" - if it's too slow buy a faster machine.
> 
> Aside #2: I do think all the effort put into speeding up the Erlang emulator
> and runtime system has been well spent, though, as it makes my 333MHz P2 at
> home seem speedy :)


I think Joe's point is more about "write *beautiful* code that
is correct" then worry about the speed once you have nothing else
better to do.

Unlike the Java VM, the Erlang runtime is small, lean and doesn't
need much added to it with each release.  Thus the C level guys
working on that part of the system must have gotten bored at
some point and spent a few minutes optimizing.  :)  Its better
that its _correct_ though than it is fast.  We have _enourmous_
stability problems with the Java VM here at work, and the company
is starting to regret the millions we have poured into the Java
platform because of its inherent instability.  One of Erlang's
best features is its STABLE!

Most developers focus too early on speed and not enough on just
writing clear, concise code that does only what is required of it
(and correctly).  Erlang developers are either just better, or
the language allows them to more easily focus on these more
important points of development (then overoptimizing too early).

-- 
Shawn.