Unfortunately JavaScript is the only programming language I have experience with. So naturally my gut instinct is to wonder why you wouldn't write a programming language (in this case Node) in JavaScript?
Why C? What benefits are you getting?
asked Jan 25, 2017 at 18:40
Antonio Pavicevac-Ortiz
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5Node.js is written in C++. C and C++ are different languages, with different strengths and weaknesses. C is strongest in getting the most direct access and closest control over hardware--the Linux Kernel, for example, is in C. C++ is good at coordinating the connections among hundreds of modules; that suits it well for something like Node.Lee Daniel Crocker– Lee Daniel Crocker2017-01-25 18:58:56 +00:00Commented Jan 25, 2017 at 18:58
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8Node is just Chrome's V8 engine, so your real question is, Why was V8 written in C++?ndugger– ndugger2017-01-25 20:03:12 +00:00Commented Jan 25, 2017 at 20:03
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Because you need something to run javascript on, there need to be some base vm, it can't just run on itself. And the VM was written in C++ because its fast and mature, you don't want to wait an eternity for page to load do you ?frakod– frakod2022-06-25 11:46:41 +00:00Commented Jun 25, 2022 at 11:46
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3 Answers
C is a low-level language suited to systems programming--i.e. the construction of operating systems, database engines, and other code that must be highly efficient (in both time and space used to complete a given task). C is "close to the bare metal," compiling everything effectively into machine code and CPU instructions.
You can certainly write compilers and middleware in higher-level languages than C. While there can be a speed-of-development advantage for doing so, they will almost always run slower and consume far more memory. Many languages (Python, PHP, JavaScript, ...) are implemented in C (or C++) as a result.
If you wanted to implement something like Node in another language, you would probably best look to another language that majors on systems programming, such as C++, C#, Rust, D, ...
4 Comments
Lee Daniel Crocker
Node is written is C++.
Antonio Pavicevac-Ortiz
The wikipage
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Node.js actually references C, C++, JavaScript. But I changed the title of my question!
muusbolla
libuv, which is the absolute core of the high performance asynchronous networking that Node.js is famous for, is written in pure C.
Bemipefe
A program is slower if the code which implements it is not optimized or efficient. I believe that the code which implements C++ is provided by a professional team of developers and is much more stable and faster than the C code which can be written by a single developer. An anomalous consumption of memory is often caused by memory leaks which are very common in C code and hard to solve while they can be entirely avoided in C++. So except very specific piece of code, libraries for very specific hardware, is much more convenient to write code in C++. All program lifecycle would benefit from it.
Node.js is built on chrome's V8 engine(which allows it to execute javascript), so you should ask that why was v8 written in c++?
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Node js is created using JavaScript language which can be run in the desktop to create application. Node js is also written in C++ because when the web server needs access to internal system functionality such as networking.
C++ has many features that let it directly interact with the OS directly JavaScript does not! So it has to work with C++ to control these computer features.
Referring to client and server side architecture example . (Here Mick is the client) Mick's Mac/Windows needs access to a website which is hosted in the internet somewhere in a server which basically a computer.
