What are some compiled programming languages that compile fast?

Question

I think I finally know what I want in a compiled programming language, a fast compiler. I get the feeling that this is a really superficial thing to care about but some time after switching from Java to Scala for a while I realized that being able to make a small change in code and immediately run the program is actually quite important to me. Besides Java and Go I don't know of any languages that really value compile speed.

Answer 1

Delphi/Object Pascal. Make a change, press F9 and it runs - you don't even notice the compile time. A full rebuild of a fairly substantial project that we run takes of the order of 10-20 seconds, even on a fairly wimpy machine

There's an open source variant available at www.freepascal.org. I've not messed with it but it reportedly is just as fast - it's the design of the Pascal language that allows this.

Answer 2

Java isn't fast for compiling. The feature you a looking for is probably a hot replacement/redeployment while coding. Eclipse recompiles just the files you changed.

You could try some interpreted languages. They usually don't require compiling at all.

I wouldn't choose a language based on compilation speed...

Answer 3

Java is not the fastest compiler out there.

Pascal (and its close relatives) is designed to be fast - it can be compiled in a single pass. Objective Caml is known for its compilation speed (and there is a REPL too).

On the other hand, what you really need is REPL, not a fast recompilation and re-linking of everything. So you may want to try a language which supports an incremental compilation. Clojure fits well (and it is built on top of the same JVM you're used to). Common Lisp is another option.