{"id":10536,"date":"2021-03-03T08:00:04","date_gmt":"2021-03-03T16:00:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/?p=10536"},"modified":"2021-03-02T14:49:02","modified_gmt":"2021-03-02T22:49:02","slug":"why-we-switched-from-python-to-go","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/softwareengineeringdaily.com\/2021\/03\/03\/why-we-switched-from-python-to-go\/","title":{"rendered":"Why We Switched from Python to Go"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Switching to a new language is always a big step, especially when only one of your team members has prior experience with that language. Early this year, we switched\u00a0Stream\u2019s<\/a>\u00a0primary programming language from Python to Go. This post will explain some of the reasons why we decided to leave Python behind and make the switch to Go. Thanks to\u00a0Ren Sakamoto<\/a>\u00a0for translating\u00a0Why we switched from Python to Go into Japanese, \u306a\u305c\u79c1\u9054\u306f Python \u304b\u3089 Go \u306b\u79fb\u884c\u3057\u305f\u306e\u304b<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Reason 1 – Performance<\/h2>\n

Go is fast! Go is extremely fast. The performance is similar to that of Java or C++. For our use case, Go is typically 40 times faster than Python. Here\u2019s a small benchmark game comparing\u00a0Go vs Python<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Reason 2 – Language Performance Matters<\/h2>\n

For many applications, the programming language is simply the glue between the app and the database. The performance of the language itself usually doesn\u2019t matter much. Stream, however, is an\u00a0API provider<\/a>\u00a0powering a\u00a0feeds<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0chat platform<\/a>\u00a0for 700 companies and more than 500 million end users. We\u2019ve been optimizing Cassandra, PostgreSQL, Redis, etc. for years, but eventually, you reach the limits of the language you\u2019re using. Python is a great language but its performance is pretty sluggish for use cases such as serialization\/deserialization, ranking and aggregation. We frequently ran into performance issues where Cassandra would take 1ms to retrieve the data and Python would spend the next 10ms turning it into objects.<\/p>\n

Reason 3 – Developer Productivity & Not Getting Too Creative<\/h2>\n

Have a look at this little snippet of Go code from the\u00a0How I Start Go tutorial<\/a>. (This is a great tutorial and a good starting point to pick up a bit of Go.)<\/p>\n

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If you\u2019re new to Go, there\u2019s not much that will surprise you when reading that little code snippet. It showcases multiple assignments, data structures, pointers, formatting and a built-in HTTP library. When I first started programming I always loved using Python\u2019s more advanced features. Python allows you to get pretty creative with the code you\u2019re writing. For instance, you can:<\/p>\n