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Add to SafariWhen comparing DASH vs Java, the Slant community recommends DASH for most people. In the question“What is the best programming language to learn first?” DASH is ranked 52nd while Java is ranked 56th. The most important reason people chose DASH is:
Dash has a very fast startup, this happens because the shell is started a lot of times during boot and dash minimizes the work it does during this process.
Question Ranking
Pros
Pro Fast startup
Dash has a very fast startup, this happens because the shell is started a lot of times during boot and dash minimizes the work it does during this process.
Pro Low memory usage, which matters a lot in embedded
It is designed to be very lightweight and has no support for shell specific extensions that are not POSIX.
Pro Default shell on Debian systems
DASH is the default shell for Debian based systems due to it speed, full POSIX compliance and low overhead.
Pro Full POSIX support
It's fully POSIX compatible, so if your script runs on dash it will probably run on all other shells.
Pro A perfect clone
It's a clone of the original System V4 Bourne shell.
Pro Verbosity
It makes it easy to debug and to read code.
Pro Mature ecosystem
The language and all its tools have enough time to age and they've aged well.
Pro Type-safe
It is easier to catch errors sooner.
Cons
Con Doesn't support all bash features
Dash does not support all bash features, sometimes called 'bashisms' unless explicitly pointed at /bin/sh.
Con Memory hungry
Running the virtual machine, application server and application itself consumes significant amount of resources.
Con Unnecessarily obtuse and verbose
If you like typing 40 lines of code to open a file, Java is the language for you. If, on the other hand, you’d actually like to get something done, look elsewhere.
Con Oracle
Enough said.
In more detail: Oracle has acquired Java from Sun and continues to surround it with controversy ever since (legendary lawsuit with google, money extortion from the enterprise users etc.).
