What are the best languages to learn for embedded systems programming?

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11

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139

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Apr 12, 2023

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Here’s the Deal

10 Options Considered

Best languages to learn for embedded systems programming	Price	Current stable version	Standard
82 C	-	C'18	ISO/IEC 9899:2011/Cor 1:2012 or C11
-- Rust	-	1.71.1	-
-- C++	-	-	ISO/IEC 14882 or C++17
-- Golang	-	1.21.0	-
-- Forth	-	-	-

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score 29 · Answer 1

C

Top Pro

Teaches good practices

Writing in C will require you to understand how things are done. C implies using and understanding the fundamentals. Learning a higher-level language after is much easier. See More

Top Con

Does not support modules; header file annoyances

Modules save programmer time. Some programming languages make use of modules which eliminate the need for C includes and header files. Modules only have to be compiled once, and when importing those modules into your software project, you only have to pull in the module that you are using, which is often times already precompiled. This way, the compiler knows exactly what it needs before beginning to compile your project and can automatically compile the few dependencies it needs in advance. See More

Specs

Current stable version:C'18

Standard:ISO/IEC 9899:2011/Cor 1:2012 or C11

Typing discipline:static

Paradigm:imperative

See All Specs

Top Pro

Industry standard

C is the industry standard programming language, moreover, it is the most popular programming language to use. C is the language used for most Windows, UNIX and Mac operating systems. See More

Top Con

Long learning curve

While the language compliments knowledge of computer components very well, and gives a deeper understanding, it is also quite difficult to learn, and to use correctly, especially without aforementioned knowledge. See More

Top Pro

Portability

C is portable between most hardware. Generally a C compiler is made for any new architecture, and already exists for existing architectures. C is portable between all operating systems (Windows, UNIX and Mac) and only needs a program to be recompiled to work. This allows anyone on any operating system to learn about the language and not be held back by intricacies of their operating system. With this said, C's portability these days is not quite what it used to be. Much of said portability relies on the POSIX standard in particular, and as time passes, the compliance of a given system with that standard is becoming less certain; especially in the case of Linux. Most things will still be portable (or at least emulatable) between Windows, Linux, and FreeBSD for example; but you will at times need to make use of platform-specific support libraries for certain individual cases, as well. See More

Top Con

Dated programming concepts

C lacks built in versions of a large majority of programming concepts that other languages make use of today. See More

Top Pro

Understanding of computers

Learning C forces you to grapple with the low-level workings of your computer (memory management, pointers, etc.) in ways that the other languages abstract away. Without an understanding of these low-level aspects of computer programming you will be limited if you try to develop an application that needs to run in a memory or performance constrained environment. Other languages like Python can obscure a lot of details, so your foundation may be weaker. See More

Top Con

The need for C developers in the current market is for engineering

It is the language of choice for embedded programming. But computer science, information technology, and software engineering programs often do not teach C. It is electrical engineering and computer engineering that do. So expect to learn how a computer works to get work done. See More

Top Pro

Must-have

Capability to program in C is greatly appreciated in developers, creates an image of competency, and many programmers will learn it at some point in their careers. See More

Top Con

Hard to maintain older software projects due to lack of testing practices

Older C code is not inspired by test driven development. So setting up old code bases to be properly tested for bugs can be more of a chore than it is worth. See More

Top Pro

If you can't grok C you should not be a professional programmer

It sets an early bar that if you can't hurdle you might as well do something other than programming and not waste any more of your time. See More

Top Pro

Low level of abstraction

While higher level languages languages like Java and Python provide possibilities to be "more expressive" per line of code, it's much more convenient to start with "less efficient" (get me right) language, in order to get initial concepts of how things behave at lower level. Actually C is a good starting point moving to both higher and lower levels of abstraction, the good example here would be learning C before Assembler, as for general use the Assembler quite hard to understand due to low level of its abstraction (like getting the understanding on how loops work in C before trying to implement them on Assembler). See More

Top Pro

C is simple with lesser rules than any other language

C is standardized and it is the go to language when you have to speed things up. See More

Top Pro

Portable between CPU architectures

C was designed to be independent of any particular machine architecture, and so with a little care, it is easy to write "portable" programs (see here). By design, C provides constructs that map efficiently to typical machine instructions, and therefore it has found lasting use in applications that had formerly been coded in assembly language like operating systems or small embedded systems. See More

Top Pro

Basic concepts can be applied to accelerate learning any other language

You can easily pivot knowledge learned here and apply it to almost every other language. See More

Top Pro

Easy to drop down to assembly

Sometimes you really need to program directly in assembly. C’s ABI and common compiler extensions make this a piece of cake. See More

Top Pro

Portable

C is portable between most hardware. Generally a C compiler is made for any new architecture, and already exists for existing architectures. C is portable between all operating systems (Windows, UNIX, Mac, etc.) and only needs a program to be recompiled to work. This allows anyone on any operating system to learn about the language and not be held back by intricacies of their operating system. With this said, C's portability these days is not quite what it used to be. Much of said portability relies on the POSIX standard in particular, and as time passes, the compliance of a given system with that standard is becoming less certain; especially in the case of Linux. Most things will still be portable (or at least emulatable) between Windows, Linux, and FreeBSD for example; but you will at times need to make use of platform-specific support libraries and APIs as well. See More

Top Pro

More control over the code

Top Pro

The king of languages, imitated, extended but never equalled

Made of a small set of keywords and rules, only your imagination is the limit. Above all, when it comes to 'pro' programming, C is the only one to rely on. See More

Top Pro

Helps with learning other languages later

A lot of languages used in the industry have a C-like syntax (C++, Java, Javascript, C#, PHP) and starting with C will help new developers to be familiar with it's syntax and by extensions with the syntax of many popular languages. See More

Top Pro

Easy to drop down to assembly.

Sometimes you really need to program directly in assembly. C’s ABI and common compiler extensions make this a piece of cake. See More

Top Pro

Backwards compatible

I have code written 2 or 3 decades ago that still compiles and runs just fine. If you do it right in C, you will probably be able to use that code your whole career. See More

Top Pro

Has object oriented programming, generics, etc..

Not right out the box all of the time, but every good C programmer knows how to create just about everything they need to get the job done. There are books written about making OOP in C, and _Generic was added in C11. Read how to do stuff. The language takes maybe a day to learn, but there are decades of tools and concepts laying around. This is because it can do everything, and works pretty much anywhere electronic, and the C standard committee aims to keep it that way. See More

See All

score 25 · Answer 2

Rust

Top Con

Slow compiler

In larger projects, build times can be a problem. There are efforts to fix this (cargo check, MIR, LLVM5), but currently rustc is slower than any C++ compiler. See More

Top Pro

Catch errors at compile-time

Since Rust is statically typed, you can catch multiple errors during compile time. This is extremely helpful with debugging, especially compared with dynamically typed languages that may fail silently during runtime. See More

ImaginativeShennong's Experience

After spending signifcant time using this language, it hits as more hype and grift (for a select few) than really useful and productive. Then there is the 'Rust Evangelism' and 'Rust Foundation', which just comes across as bananas. Rust Foundation is like a drunk dictator, trying to force what we have never seen any other language try to do: 1) Prohibit firearms at their events. 2) No using "rust" in crate names. 3) No using "rust" in product or service name. 4) No using "rust" in domain or company name. 5) No using "rust" if user group or conference makes a profit. 6) Your trademarek must be bigger than theirs on your own website. 7) Must comply with local health regulations, because they say so. Rust is a low productivity, masochistically difficult, ugly syntax, long compile time, not so safe as hype suggests language. If really out here wanting to use something besides C/C++, in 98% of use cases, would do just as well or be better off using something other than Rust. Nim, Golang, Dlang, Vlang, Zig... See More

Specs

Platforms:Linux, MacOS X, Windows, BSD

Current stable version:1.71.1

License:MIT/Apache

Top Con

Hyped up on memory safety

Many users in the community believe that memory safety is a unique or special feature of Rust. See More

Top Pro

Makes developers write optimal code

Rust is a modern programming language written around systems. It was designed from the ground up this way. It's language design makes developers write optimal code almost all the time, meaning you don't have to fully know and understand the compiler's source code in order to optimize your program. Furthermore, Rust does not copy from memory unnecessarily, to give an example: all types move by default and not copy. Even references to types do not copy by default. In other words, setting a reference to another reference destroys the original one unless it's stated otherwise. See More

PerceptiveDievas's Experience

Very nice to work with (compared to C++). Excellent package management. High-quality libraries that don't have many bugs (because errors are caught as early as possible). Easy to maintain due to modules. Rust is good for writing stable, reusable code - write it once, never touch it again. See More

Top Con

Lots of bloat

Nobody wants to make a compiler for this language for a random 8-bit or less microcontroller. Too many language features and no actual standard. See More

Top Pro

Generics support

You don't have to write same array and dictionary classes hundreds and thousands times for strong type check by compiler. See More

Top Con

Significant time required to understand the language fully

There's the infamous borrow checker for example. See More

Top Pro

Official package manager and build tool

Cargo is the official package manager for Rust. It comes with the language and downloads dependencies, compiles packages, and makes and uploads distributable packages. See More

Top Con

Low readability

Harder to read and understand language. See More

Top Pro

Zero-cost futures or Async IO

Top Con

Rust not as safe as it pretends to be

Rust problems: 1) Massive undisclosed usage of unsafe. 2) Massive amounts of memory safety CVEs - see details. 3) Large bloated Rust binaries increase attack surface for exploits. 4) Many corporate types claiming Rust is safe, don't actually program or use it (have some quiet financial interest to push it). See More

Top Pro

Support for macros

When you identify a part of your code which gets repeated often, which you cannot abstract using functions or classes, you can use Rust's built-in Macros. See More

Top Con

Not as useful or productive as advertised.

If really out here wanting to use something besides C/C++, in 98% of use cases, would do just as well or be better off using something other than Rust. Will complete the project faster, would be easier, will be happier, and nearly as safe (use newer language with optional GC). See More

Top Pro

Supports cross compilation for different architectures

Since Rust 1.8 you can install additional versions of the standard library for different targets using rustup/multirust. For example: $ rustup target add x86_64-unknown-linux-musl Which then allows for: $ cargo build --target x86_64-unknown-linux-musl See More

Top Con

Very ugly and verbose syntax

Compared to many languages. One tool needed to be productive is the language to be pleasing and effective, yet Rust friction is as high as its safety. See More

Top Pro

Built-in concurrency

Rust has built-in support for concurrency. See More

Top Con

Long compile times

Way longer to compile than other languages. See More

Top Pro

Threads without data races

Unique ownership system guarantees a mutable data to be owned and mutated by only one thread at a time, so there's no data race, and this guarantee is checked at compile time statically. Which means easy multi-threading. Of course, immutable data can be shared among multiple threads freely. See More

Top Con

Low productivity

The compiler is strict, such as ownership and borrowing checkers. See More

Top Pro

Compiles to machine code allowing for extra efficiency

Rust uses LLVM as a backend, among other things this allows Rust code to compile down to machine languages. This allows developers to write programs that run as efficiently as possible. See More

Top Con

No language standard

Top Pro

Easy to write understandable code

While not as verbose as Java, it still is much more verbose than languages like Go and Python. This means that the code is very explicit and easy to understand. See More

Top Con

Hard to find learning resources or libraries

Because it's still a relatively new language, Rust does not enjoy a following as large as other languages/environments. Rust development has also been rather volatile for a long time during the beginning of the development of the language adding to this issue. Because of the small community, it's harder to find useful libraries for projects or any other kind of resource. See More

Top Con

Asynchronous I/O is not (yet) a part of the core language

The issue of asynchronous I/O is still being discussed as a language feature, and not yet in the implementation phase. See the RFC on GitHub here. See More

See All

score 12 · Answer 3

C++

Top Pro

Powerful memory management

Allows puting large arrays on the "heap" to avoid "stack overflow". See More

Top Con

Undefined behavior

Subtle errors can render the entire program "undefined" by the complicated C++ standard. The standard imposes no requirements in such cases. Thus C++ compiler writers are free to ignore the existence of such cases and Bad Things are prone to happen instead. Even experts can't reliably avoid undefined cases in C++, so how can beginners be expected to do so? See More

José Rodrigo's Experience

Powerfull cross-platform libraries. See More

Specs

Standard: ISO/IEC 14882 or C++17

Engine:UE4 , Cocos-2d-x

Top Pro

Huge language supports most everything

C++ is a large language with an even larger community and following. It has libraries for every kind of task that is possible to do with C++. See More

Top Con

Tough to learn as the first language

Many of the concepts are hard to grasp if you have no prior programming experience. See More

Top Pro

Teaches fundamental OOP

Teaches you to leverage object oriented programming. See More

Top Con

Huge language gets in the way of learning

C++ is such an atrociously over-complicated language that its learning curve may get in the way of learning fundamentals. Learning C++ well is a ten-year project, and even experts are frequently surprised by the language. See More

Top Pro

Teaches low-level programming, but doesn't have as many pitfalls as C

Teaches data types, low-level program flow and the so common C-style syntax while not being as much of a pain as C itself. See More

Top Con

Bugs easily corrupt the memory

You can usually get a core dump, but often the call stack gets completely overwritten. Compilers are not even consistent in how they map the binary objects to code. See More

Top Pro

C code can be used in C++ code

Most C code will work as C++ See More

Top Con

Library system is not great

C++ uses the #include mechanism provided by C. Which unfortunately is a poor way of accessing the API of a library. Some of the reasons why the module system is weak are: Compile time scalability: The compiler must preprocess every header included in a file, and every header included in those headers. This process must be repeated for every translation unit in the program. As can be imagined, this doesn't scale very well. For each header added you are increasing the compilation time exponentially. Fragile: library included are treated as textual imports by the compiler. This causes all sorts of problems since they are subject to any macro definitions in the time of the inclusion. If any of these macro definitions collide with a name in the library it can break the library API . See More

Top Pro

STD is often updated

The functionalities keep growing throughout the years. C++11 gave us a soft type of garbage collecting with the smart pointers. See More

Top Con

No reflection

C++ objects are frustratingly opaque. This makes debugging especially difficult, something beginners have to do a lot. See More

Top Pro

Teaches problem solving

The great STL is the most powerful Data Structure and Algorithms Library. It would benefit you very much in problem solving, your main way to love programming. The code is much more compact compared to Java and C#. No unnecessary classes are in your way; yet when you need classes they are available unlike C. The code runs very fast. See More

Top Con

No two programmers can agree on which 10% subset of C++ to use

C++ is such a huge and complicated language, that programmers have to learn a disciplined subset of it to reliably get anything done. The problem is, no-one can agree on which subset to use and they can't understand each other. See More

Top Pro

Excellent compiler optimization

Both open source compilers (such as Clang and GCC), and proprietary ones (like Intel's and Microsoft's) are very good at analyzing program flow and program optimization. This is mostly due to the widespread usage of C/C++ applications running everything from mobile/desktop/server Operating Systems, to search engines and webserver software, and the demand for performance. See More

Top Pro

Universal, portable, best complexity/efficiency trade-off

Top Pro

Best way to understand algorithms

See All

score 10 · Answer 4

Golang

Top Con

Performance slowdown because of indirect calls and garbage collection

Practically no meaningful Go application can be written without indirect function calls and garbage collection, these are central to Go's core infrastructure. But these are major impediments to achieving good performance. See More

Top Pro

Performance is on the order of C and Java

Go is blazing fast, but easier to write than Python, JS, Ruby, or many other dynamic languages. See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, Linux, Mac etc.

Current stable version:1.21.0

Developer:Google with Ken Thompson, Robert Griesemer, Rob Pike

Top Con

Easy to shadow variable

Due to single character only difference, declare and assign statement can easily shadow variable from outer scope unconsciously. Example: err := nil if xxx { err := somefunctionthatreturnsanerr } return err // always return nil See More

Top Pro

Built-in unit testing

The idiomatic approach to writing a Go software project is to perform test-driven development with unit testing. Every source code file should have an associated *_test.go file which tests functions in the code. See More

Top Con

Hard to abstract even the simplest notions

Go is famously regarded as very simple. However, this simplicity becomes problematic in time. Programmers who use Go find themselves over and over again writing the same thing from a very low point of view. Domains not already served by libraries that are easy to glue are very difficult to get into. See More

Top Pro

Syntax for exported code from a package is simplified to be less verbose than other languages

Any variable, type and function whose name begins with a capital letter will be exported by a project, while all other code remains private. There is no longer a need to signify that a piece of code is 'private' or 'public' manually. See More

Top Pro

Automatically generates API documentation for installed packages

Godoc is provided to automatically generate API documentation for Go projects. Godoc also hosts it’s own self-contained web server that will list documentation for all installed packages in your Go path. See More

Top Pro

Supports functional programming techniques such as function literals

This naturally also supports first class and high order functions, so you may pass functions as variables to other functions. See More

Top Pro

Easy to install and configure; simple to compile software

Go software can be immediately installed, regardless of your operating system, package manager, or processor architecture with the go get command. Software is compiled statically by default so there is no need to worry about software dependencies on the client system. Makefiles and headers are no longer necessary, as the package system automatically resolves dependencies, downloads source code and compiles via a single command: go build. See More

Top Pro

Great language for building networking services

Go was started as a systems language but now it has fully committed in the niche of networking services. This has been a brilliant move by Go because it allows them to capitalize on the immense talent of the Go engineering team (who are in the most part network engineers). In a world dominated by Java EE and slow scripting language, Go was a breath of fresh air and it continues to be one of the most powerful languages if you want to build networking services. See More

Top Pro

Multiple variables may be assigned on a single line

This conveniently eliminates the need to create temporary variables. Fibonacci example: x, y = y, x+y See More

Top Pro

Supports splitting source code into multiple files

As long as every source code file in a directory has the same package name, the compiler will automatically concatenate all of the files together during the compilation process. See More

Top Pro

Supports 'modules' in the form of packages

Every Go source file contains a package line that indicates which package a file belongs to. If the name of the package is 'main', it indicates that this is a program that will be compiled into a binary. Otherwise, it will recognize that it is a package. See More

Top Pro

Demonstrates a unique, simple concept to object-oriented programming

All types are essentially objects, be they type aliases or structs. The compiler automatically associates types to their methods at compile time. Those methods are automatically associated to all interfaces that match. This allows you to gain the benefits of multiple inheritance without glue code. As a result of the design, classes are rendered obsolete and the resulting style is easy to comprehend. See More

Top Pro

Programmers don't have to argue over what 10% subet of the language to implement in their software project

The language promotes programming in a specific idiomatic style, which helps keep every programmer on the same page. See More

Top Pro

Simplified C-like syntax that is as easy to read and write as Python

The language is designed in a manner that seems logical. Syntax is simplified to reduce burden on the programmer and compiler developers. See More

Top Pro

Great team working behind it

Go has a solid team of engineers working on it (some of the best networking engineers in the world are working on Go). Up until now, the great engineering of the language has compensated for its lack of power. See More

Top Pro

The go compiler compiles binaries instantly — as fast as a scripting language interpreter

Compiled binaries are fast — about as fast in C in most cases. Compiles on every OS without effort — truly cross-platform compiler. As a result of the fast compilation speed, you can use the gorun program to use go source code as if it was a scripting language. See More

Top Pro

Exceptionally simple and scalable multithreaded and concurrent programming

Goroutines are "lightweight threads" that runs on OS threads. They provide a simple way for concurrent operations — prepending a function with go will execute it concurrently. It utilizes channels for communication between goroutines which aids to prevent races and makes synchronizing execution effortless across goroutines. The maximum number of OS threads goroutines can run on may be defined at compile time with the GOMAXPROCS variable. See More

Top Pro

API documentation is rich in content; easy to memorize

Only features deemed critical are added to the language to prevent cruft from working it's way into the language. The language is small enough to fit inside one's head without having to repeatedly open documentation. Documentation is hosted on an official webpage in a manner that is simple to read and understand. See More

Top Pro

Provides tools for automatically formatting code for your entire software project

This helps keep every programmer on the same page in a project and eliminates arguments over formatting styles. See More

See All

score 9 · Answer 5

Forth

Top Pro

Interactive

The interpreter can run on the target system with a minimal interface to trade bytes. There's no compile/link/download process. You build and test the functions incrementally and iterate quickly. See More

score 5 · Answer 6

V

Top Pro

Fast as C

V is easier than C and fast like C. See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, Linux, Mac

License:MIT

Developer:Alexander Medvednikov

Typing discipline:Strong, static, inferred, structural

See All Specs

Top Pro

Generics

V has generics. See More

Top Pro

Simplicity

V is simple and powerful. See More

Top Pro

Sum types

V has sum types. See More

Top Pro

Cross-platform

Compile to many OSes. See More

Top Pro

Fast compile times

Compiles programs fast, less waiting around, so more productive and fun. See More

Top Pro

C Interop

Can import C libraries, structs, and headers. See More

Top Pro

Closures

V has closures, which gives the user additional options and usefulness. See More

Top Pro

Can create multi-OS GUIs

Multi-OS GUI creation is more integrated into the language than others. See More

Top Pro

Clear syntax

Highly understandable language. See More

Top Pro

Inline assembly

Can add Assembly code. See More

Top Pro

Single paradigm

Follows the philosophy that there should be only one way to do something, as opposed to multi-paradigm languages like C++. See More

Top Pro

GUI editor

A visual editor for building native GUI apps is planned, it will use WinAPI/GDI+ on Windows, Cocoa on macOS. On Linux custom drawing is used. See More

See All

score 4 · Answer 7

Nim

Top Con

Memory management blues

Too many that don't work. Continual performance issues. See More

Top Pro

Built-in Unicode support

You can use unicode names for variables, there is "unicode" module for operations with unicode. See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, MacOS/iOS, Linux /Android/Termux, *BSD, Solaris/SmartOS, HaikuOS, lots of others

Current stable version:1.6.12

License:MIT

CPU:All CPU architectures that have an ANSI C compiler or JavaScript interpreter

See All Specs

Top Con

Generics done horribly

Plain horrible to deal with. See More

Top Pro

Multi paradigm

Imperative, OOP, functional programming in one language. See More

Top Con

Whitespace sensitive syntax

Cause of unnecessary errors, eye strain, and ugliness. See More

Top Pro

Easy to read

Nim has a lot of common with Python in terms of syntax. Indentation-based syntax, for/while loops. See More

Top Con

Bad thread model

Not turned on by default. Has very odd and convoluted rules on memory sharing between threads. Harder to use. See More

Top Pro

Easy to integrate with another languages

You can use Nim with any language that can be interfaced with C. There's a tool which helps you to create new C and C++ bindings for Nim - c2nim. Also, you can use Nim with Objective C or even JavaScript (if you're compiling for these backends). See More

Top Con

Generates unreadable bloated C code

Defeats the purpose, with unreadable bloated C. See More

Top Pro

Has built-in async support

Nim has "asyncdispatch" module, which allows you to write async applications. See More

Top Con

Inconsistent name formatting

Headache creation with snake_case, pascalCase, and being case-insensitive too. See More

Top Pro

Garbage-collected

You don't need to deal with all those manual memory allocations, Nim can take care of it. But also you can use another GC, or tweak it for your real-time application or a game. See More

Top Con

Atrocious error messages

Unhelpful to users, wasting hours deciphering and extremely annoying. See More

Top Pro

Type interferencing

You only need to specify types in your procedures and objects - you don't need to specify type when you're creating a new variable (unless you're creating it without initialization). See More

Top Con

Failed wannabe Python knockoff language

Created in 2008, Nim has failed to make TIOBE top 100 or PYPL rankings for programming languages. Pythoners can use alternatives like Cython for a more Python-like experience. See More

Top Pro

Supports UFCS (Unified Function Call Syntax)

writeLine(stdout, "hello") can be written as stdout.writeLine("hello") proc add(a: int): int = a + 5 can be used like 6.add.echo or 6.add().echo() See More

Top Con

Lacks void / null safety

Easy to get involved in safety issues. See More

Top Pro

Has built-in unittest module

With built-in "unittest" module you can create test with a very readable code. See More

Top Pro

Strict typing

Checks your code at compile time. See More

Top Pro

Great metaprogramming features

There are generics, templates, macros in Nim. They can allow you to write new DSL for your application, or avoid all boilerplate stuff. See More

Top Pro

Really cross-platform

The same code can be used for web, server, desktop and mobile. See More

Top Pro

Compile-time execution

Nim has a built-in VM, which executes macros and some other code at compile time. For example, you can check if you're on Windows, and Nim will generate code only for it. See More

See All

score 5 · Answer 8

Ada

Top Pro

Best choice for systems that have to be very reliable

It is used in the french fast train TGV. The main programs running in the Airbus A3xx are programmed with a subset called SPARK (for chizophrenic people that even avoid pointers which are "access types" in Ada). It is one of the first choices used for software in the military, but also in medical embedded systems. It was designed to be used in the embedded wold for years now (since 1983). It is verbose, but this can be a readability advantage. A good contender to Rust. See More

Top Con

Documentation is a drag

This can be much improved. The latest standard is Ada2012, and the book choices are small. There is a book from John Barnes. This seems like a comprehension and not a teaching book. Lack of good diagrams and sometimes bad didactics. See More

DignifiedAsopus's Experience

Simply the best for high quality and secure software development See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, Linux, MacOS, embedded

Top Pro

Sophisticated bit manipulated on data type level

LikableOshunmare's Experience

Safe choice through strict strong typing (you begin the first minutes with screaming at the compiler) and multithreading as an inherent part of the language. Less bugs, fast code, memory friendly, capable for real time systems -> good for embedded See More

Top Pro

Expressive types

See All

score 2 · Answer 9

MIPS Assembly

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score 2 · Answer 10

ARM Assembly

Add Video or Image

score 1 · Answer 11

10 Options Considered

My Recommendation for C

My Recommendation for C

Teaches good practices

Does not support modules; header file annoyances

Industry standard

Long learning curve

Portability

Dated programming concepts

Understanding of computers

The need for C developers in the current market is for engineering

Must-have

Hard to maintain older software projects due to lack of testing practices

If you can't grok C you should not be a professional programmer

Low level of abstraction

C is simple with lesser rules than any other language

Portable between CPU architectures

Basic concepts can be applied to accelerate learning any other language

Easy to drop down to assembly

Portable

More control over the code

The king of languages, imitated, extended but never equalled

Helps with learning other languages later

Easy to drop down to assembly.

Backwards compatible

Has object oriented programming, generics, etc..

My Recommendation for Rust

My Recommendation for Rust

Slow compiler

Catch errors at compile-time

Hyped up on memory safety

Makes developers write optimal code

Lots of bloat

Generics support

Significant time required to understand the language fully

Official package manager and build tool

Low readability

Zero-cost futures or Async IO

Rust not as safe as it pretends to be

Support for macros

Not as useful or productive as advertised.

Supports cross compilation for different architectures

Very ugly and verbose syntax

Built-in concurrency

Long compile times

Threads without data races

Low productivity

Compiles to machine code allowing for extra efficiency

No language standard

Easy to write understandable code

Hard to find learning resources or libraries

Asynchronous I/O is not (yet) a part of the core language

My Recommendation for C++

My Recommendation for C++

Powerful memory management

Undefined behavior

Huge language supports most everything

Tough to learn as the first language

Teaches fundamental OOP

Huge language gets in the way of learning

Teaches low-level programming, but doesn't have as many pitfalls as C

Bugs easily corrupt the memory

C code can be used in C++ code

Library system is not great

STD is often updated

No reflection

Teaches problem solving

No two programmers can agree on which 10% subset of C++ to use

Excellent compiler optimization

Universal, portable, best complexity/efficiency trade-off

Best way to understand algorithms

My Recommendation for Golang

My Recommendation for Golang

Performance slowdown because of indirect calls and garbage collection

Performance is on the order of C and Java

Easy to shadow variable

Built-in unit testing

Hard to abstract even the simplest notions

Syntax for exported code from a package is simplified to be less verbose than other languages

Automatically generates API documentation for installed packages