[unscaled]

I'm afraid this article kinda fails at at its job. It starts out with a very bold claim ("Zig is not only a new programming language, but it’s a totally new way to write programs"), but ends up listing a bunch of features that are not unique to Zig or even introduced by Zig: type inference (Invented in the late 60s, first practically implemented in the 80s), anonymous structs (C#, Go, Typescript, many ML-style languages), labeled breaks, functions that are not globally public by default...

It seems like this is written from the perspective of C/C++ and Java and perhaps a couple of traditional (dynamically typed) languages.

On the other hand, the concept that makes Zig really unique (comptime) is not touched upon at all. I would argue compile-time evaluation is not entirely new (you can look at Lisp macros back in the 60s), but the way Zig implements this feature and how it is used instead of generics is interesting enough to make Zig unique. I still feel like the claim is a bit hyperbolic, but there is a story that you can sell about Zig being unique. I wanted to read this story, but I feel like this is not it.

[WalterBright]

D has had compile time function execution since 2007 or so.

https://dlang.org/spec/function.html#interpretation

It doesn't need a keyword to trigger it. Any expression that is a const-expression in the grammar triggers it.

[ScottRedig]

Hello Mr. Bright. I've seen similar comments from you in response to Zig before. Specifically, in the comments on blog post I made about Zig's comptime. I took some time reading D's documentation to try to understand your point (I didn't want to miss some prior art, after all). By the time I felt like I could give a reply, the thread was days old, so I didn't bother.

The parent comment acknowledges that compile time execution is not new. There is little in Zig that is, broad strokes, entirely new. It is in the specifics of the design that I find Zig's ergonomics to be differentiated. It is my understanding that D's compile time function execution is significantly different from Zig's comptime.

Mostly, this is in what Zig doesn't have as a specific feature, but uses comptime for. For generics, D has templates, Zig has functions which take types and return types. D has conditional compilation (version keyword), while Zig just has if statements. D has template mixins, Zig trusts comptime to have 90% of the power for 10% of the headache. The power of comptime is commonly demonstrated, but I find the limitations to be just as important.

A difference I am uncertain about is if there's any D equivalent for Zig having types being expressions. You can, for example, calculate what the return type should be given a type of an argument.

Is this a fair assessment?

[tialaramex]

Maybe I don't understand, in D, how do I write a function which makes a new type?

For example Zig has a function ArrayHashMapWithAllocator which returns well, a hash table type in a fairly modern style, no separate chaining and so on

Not an instance of that type, it returns the type itself, the type didn't exist, we called the function, now it does exist, at compile time (because clearly we can't go around making new types at runtime in this sort of language)

[brabel]

Yes and D's comptime is much more fun, IMHO than Zig's! Yet everyone talks about Zig's comptime as if it were unique or new.

[jhgb]

But Zig doesn't need a keyword to trigger it either? If it's possible at all, it will be done. The keyword should just prevent run-time evaluation. (Unless I grossly misunderstood something.)

[pron]

Partial evaluation has been quite well known at least since 1943 and Kleene's Smn proof. It has since been put to use, in various forms, by quite a few languages (including C++ in 1990, and even C in the early seventies). But the extent and the way in which Zig specifically puts it to use -- which includes, but is not limited to, how it is used to replace other features that can then be avoided (and all without macros) -- is unprecedented.

Pointing out that other languages have used partial evaluation, sometimes even in ways that somewhat overlap with Zig's use, completely misses the point. It's at least as misplaced as saying that there was nothing new or special about iPhone's no-buttons design because touch screens had existed since the sixties.

If you think Zig's comptime is just about running some computations at compile time, you should take a closer look.

[jadbox]

Hi Walter! Big fan. What do you think of Zig? How would you like to see it evolve? Are there any things from Zig that inspire you to work in D?

[rurban]

Perl5 had it before. Either by constant-folding, or by BEGIN blocks.

Constant-folding just got watered down by the many dynamic evangelists in the decades after, that even C or C++ didn't enforce it properly. In perl5 is was watered down on add (+) by some hilariously wrong argumentation then. So you could precompute mult const expressions, but not add.

[pmkary]

When I read "I can easily say that Zig is not only a new programming language, but it’s a totally new way to write programs" I expected to see something as shocking as LISP/Smalltalk/Realtalk/EVE/FORTH/Prolog... A whole new paradigm, a whole new way to program. Or at least a new concept like the pure functionalism of Haskell, or Prototyping like in Lua/JS/Io. And I was so damn shocked how I must have missed something so huge, having read the entirety of Zig's documentation and not have noticed anything? As you mentioned, turned out nothing, and I was shocked then why is it in the top of HN? Also turned out for no reason based on the comments.

[skotobaza]

The idea of modern society is "get hyped for the new thing". Tech crowd did not escape that unfortunately, and keeps rediscovering techniques that were already possible more that 50 years ago. Because they don't want to learn the history of the technology they are using.

[wolvesechoes]

Dev celebs makes blogposts and videos on how Zig is awesome and unique, so the herd repeats.

[spacechild1]

> Also turned out for no reason based on the comments.

The reason is the clickbait title.

[phplovesong]

Agreed.

But i would not put comptime as some sort of magical invention. Its still just a newish take on meta programming. We had that since forever. From my minimal time with Zig i kind of think comptime as a better version of c++ templates.

That said Zig is possibly a better alternative to c++, but not that exiting for me. I kind of dont get why so many think its the holy grail, first it was rust, and now zig.

[johnisgood]

As much as I dislike Rust, I gotta give it credit where it's due. It has something unique: a borrow checker. What is so unique in Zig?

[HarHarVeryFunny]

> I'm afraid this article kinda fails at at its job

Yeah, I know nothing about Zig, and was excited by the author's opening statement that Zig is the most surprising language he has encountered in a 45 yr software career...

But this is then immediately followed by saying that ability to compile C code, and to cross-compile, are the most incredible parts of it, which is when I immediately lost interest. Having a built-in C compiler is certainly novel, and perhaps convenient for inter-op, but if the value goes significantly beyond that then the author is failing to communicate that.

[brabel]

The code samples are so weird... Some are images, others are not, and there's like 10 different color schemes (even among the textual ones, it's not consistent). That actually takes some kind of effort to achieve :D.

[bdangubic]

gives you a preview of the experience of using it :)

[wseqyrku]

> Zig is not only a new programming language, but it’s a totally new way to write programs

I'd say the same thing about Rust. I find it the best way to express when what code should run at any given point in the program and the design is freakin interstellar: It is basically a "query engine" where you write a query of some code against the entire available "code space" including root crate and its dependencies. Once you understand that programming becomes naming bits and then queries for the ones you wish to execute.

[JoeyJoJoJr]

As someone not really familiar with Rust, this sounds intriguing, but I don’t full understand. Do you have any links that can or examples that could clarify this for someone who is just starting out with Rust?

[Shorel]

Compile time seems to be a standard feature in D-lang as well.

Powerful macros that generate code that then gets compiled =)

[nwhnwh]

"this article kinda fails at at its job"

Definitely.

[jb1991]

> C/C++

It has been several decades since putting a slash between these two made sense, lumping them together like this. It would be similar to saying something like Java/Scala or ObjectiveC/Swift. These are completely different languages.

[pjmlp]

Nope, that is a English grammar construct that is a shortcut for "and" and "or", as any good English grammar book will explain.

Indeed you see those for Java/Scala and Objective-C/Swift in technical books and job adverts.

Any search on the careers sites, or documentation, on companies that have seats at ISO, sell/develop C and C++ compilers, have such C/C++ references in a couple of places.

Do you need any example?

[tmtvl]

The problem is that it's a bit tricky to type the intersection symbol (∩), because C ∩ C++ makes more sense.

[1718627440]

Anonymous structs and type interference are things even C has, although support for the later one is quite recent and limited.

[pjmlp]

Yeah, as I keep repeating, it is a Modula-2 in C clothes, minus comptime, which as others have mentioned D has had for quite some time.

[tourist2d]

As a c++ developer who's heard of Zig but never dived into it, I was reading this article scratching my head wondering what is it actually so unique about it.

Why the blog has a section on how it install it on the path is also very puzzling.

[bnolsen]

Zig is simple, clever and clean. certainly not perfect but it addresses much of what I disliked about c++. I wanted to like D and rust but they seem just as complex as c++. Yes, better in some ways but still full of complexity.

[JSR_FDED]

I use Lua in 2025, it’s brilliant.

By the way, so does everyone using neovim.

[debo_]

Are you ok?

[otabdeveloper4]

> C/C++

No such thing. Also C++ has most of those features too.