String Associative Array and CombSort Benchmark 2021 Edition

Last year, we've done string associative benchmark and lesser string associative benchmark (measuring string concat operation and built-in associative array set and get), numeric comb sort benchmark and string comb sort benchmark (measuring basic array random access, string conversion, and array swap for number and string), this year's using newer server: 32-core running on 64-bit Ubuntu 21.10. This time we will skip programming languages that are no deb packages (unless the install script is just one line and doesn't ruin system directories) or no direct compile-run command like previous one, also only best of 3 runs.

$ alias time='/usr/bin/time -f "\nCPU: %Us\tReal: %es\tRAM: %MKB"

This time, NodeJS failed to complete (after waiting for an hour) with 10x more data compared to last year for assoc benchmark. Here's the spreadsheet and final result (Real duration and RAM):

Language	Command Flags	Version	Assoc	RAM	Num Comb	RAM	Str Comb	RAM	Total	RAM
Go	go run	go1.17.5	12.39	2,305,824	0.46	83,096	3.33	245,896	16.18	2,634,816
Java	java	18-ea+15-Ubuntu-4	10.70	5,582,308	0.96	170,240	6.93	722,152	18.59	6,474,700
Nim	nim r -d:release --gc:arc	1.4.2	17.90	4,200,212	1.21	79,444	5.45	633,816	24.56	4,913,472
Python	pypy	7.3.5	19.70	3,104,440	2.17	140,124	5.73	523,264	27.60	3,767,828
C	tcc -run	0.9.27	22.68	2,820,568	1.01	80,484	4.80	392,896	28.49	3,293,948
Julia	julia	1.6.5	23.98	3,714,448	0.52	255,844	4.60	861,076	29.10	4,831,368
V	v -prod run	0.2.4 a0a1807	20.36	8,910,856	2.67	124,248	6.48	470,136	29.51	9,505,240
Lua	luajit	2.1.0-beta3	16.70	1,133,876	3.27	133,504	10.80	511,468	30.77	1,778,848
Dart	dart	2.15.1	25.92	2,101,152	1.40	208,056	5.75	574,852	33.07	2,884,060
Crystal	crystal run --release	1.2.2	13.77	2,371,320	7.73	202,552	12.08	440,748	33.58	3,014,620
Nim	nim r -d:release	1.4.2	24.92	3,864,100	1.76	79,548	7.51	1,211,200	34.19	5,154,848
PHP	php	8.0.8	9.94	1,368,808	7.74	328,344	24.84	641,448	42.52	2,338,600
Crystal	crystal run	0.35.1	38.85	2,372,004	9.97	179,176	22.27	441,720	71.09	2,992,900
V	v run	0.2.4 a0a1807	51.81	8,911,004	6.63	79,716	18.43	470,420	76.87	9,461,140
Python	python3	3.9.7	43.11	4,106,892	29.16	405,332	43.08	722,996	115.35	5,235,220
Nim	nim r	1.4.2	88.05	3,864,048	2.93	79,536	32.60	1,211,260	123.58	5,154,844
Ruby	ruby	ruby 2.7.4p191	52.48	2,970,908	27.15	100,320	52.23	708,940	131.86	3,780,168
Javascript	node	v16.13.1	999.99	9,999,999	0.71	115,044	6.11	461,836	1006.81	10,576,879

FAQ

1. Why you measure the compile duration too? because developer experience also important (feedback loop, edit-rebuild/compile-run), at least for me, it would be sucks a lot if we have to wait a minute to compile before we can test something. We could always write precalculated values with C++ template to make runtime faster for example, but the compilation delay would be very sucks.

2. Why not warming up the VM first? each implementation have it's own advantage and disadvantage. We already know, that compiled language mostly faster at runtime, but at cost of relatively slower development feedback loop. Interpreted language mostly slower at runtime, especially if executed using VM that have startup overhead, in exception of one with AOT or JIT optimization. So to make it fair for every kind of implementation, we do it differently by not glorifying the runtime performance (which super make sense for server or long-lived process, but not best for development or CI cost which people often neglected), but by total performance which consist of Compile duration (if any) + VM startup duration (if any) + AOT or JIT duration (if any) + Runtime duration, so every strategy the PL's implementator use can be fairly judged.

3. Why there's no C++, VB.NET, C#, D, Object-Pascal? don't want to compile things (since there's no build and run command in one flag).  

4. Why there's no Kotlin, Scala, Rust, Elixir, Pony, Swift, Groovy, or Zig? Too lazy to add :3 you can contribute tho (create a pull request, then I'll run the benchmark again as preferably as there's precompiled binary/deb/apt/ppa repository for the compiler/interpreter).

5. Why there's no Ruby 3.1? I can't find any PPA for latest Ruby, latest one on Ubuntu 21.10 repo is Ruby2.7.

Contributors: ilmanzo (Nim, Crystal, D), inkydragon (Julia)

String Associative Array and CombSort Benchmark 2020 Edition

5 Years later since last string associative benchmark and lesser string associative benchmark (measuring string concat operation and built-in associative array set and get), numeric comb sort benchmark and string comb sort benchmark (measuring basic array random access, string conversion, and array swap for number and string), this year's using newer processor: AMD Ryzen 3 3100 running on 64-bit Ubuntu 20.04. Now with 10x more data to hopefully make the benchmark runs 10x slower (at least 1 sec), best of 3 runs.

$ alias time='/usr/bin/time -f "\nCPU: %Us\tReal: %es\tRAM: %MKB"'

$ php -v

PHP 7.4.3 (cli) (built: Oct  6 2020 15:47:56) ( NTS )

$ time php assoc.php 

637912 641149 67002

3808703 14182513 2343937

CPU: 1.25s      Real: 1.34s     RAM: 190644KB

$ python3 -V

Python 3.8.5

$ time python3 dictionary.py

637912 641149 67002

3808703 14182513 2343937

CPU: 5.33s      Real: 5.47s     RAM: 314564KB

$ ruby3.0 -v

ruby 3.0.0p0 (2020-12-25 revision 95aff21468) [x86_64-linux-gnu]

$ time ruby3.0 --jit hash.rb 

637912 641149 67002

3808703 14182513 2343937

CPU: 6.50s      Real: 5.94s     RAM: 371832KB

$ go version

go version go1.14.7 linux/amd64

$ time go run map.go

637912 641149 67002

3808703 14182513 2343937

CPU: 1.79s      Real: 1.56s     RAM: 257440KB

$ node -v       

v14.15.2

$ time node object.js

637912 641149 67002

3808703 14182513 2343937

CPU: 2.24s      Real: 2.21s     RAM: 326636KB

$ luajit -v 

LuaJIT 2.1.0-beta3 -- Copyright (C) 2005-2017 Mike Pall. http://luajit.org/

$ time luajit table.lua

637912  641149  67002

3808703 14182513        2343937

CPU: 4.11s      Real: 4.22s     RAM: 250828KB

$ dart --version

Dart SDK version: 2.10.4 (stable) (Unknown timestamp) on "linux_x64"

$ time dart map.dart

637912 641149 67002

3808703 14182513 2343937

CPU: 2.99s      Real: 2.91s     RAM: 385496KB

$ v version

V 0.2 36dcace

$ time v run map.v

637912, 641149, 67002

3808703, 14182513, 2343937

CPU: 4.79s      Real: 5.28s     RAM: 1470668KB

$ tcc -v

tcc version 0.9.27 (x86_64 Linux)

$ time tcc -run uthash.c

637912 641149 67002

3808703 14182513 2343937

Command exited with non-zero status 25

CPU: 2.52s      Real: 2.61s     RAM: 291912KB

$ export GOPHERJS_GOROOT="$(go1.12.16 env GOROOT)"

$ npm install --global source-map-support

$ goperjs version

GopherJS 1.12-3

$ time gopherjs 

637912 641149 67002

3808703 14182513 2343937

CPU: 14.13s     Real: 12.01s    RAM: 597712KB

$ java -version

java version "14.0.2" 2020-07-14

Java(TM) SE Runtime Environment (build 14.0.2+12-46)

Java HotSpot(TM) 64-Bit Server VM (build 14.0.2+12-46, mixed mode, sharing)

$ time java hashmap.java

637912 641149 67002

3808703 14182513 2343937

CPU: 5.18s      Real: 1.63s     RAM: 545412KB

The result shows a huge improvement for PHP since the old 5.4. NodeJS also huge improvement compared to old 0.10. The rest is quite bit the same. Also please keep note that Golang and V includes build/compile time not just run duration, and it seems V performance really bad when it comes to string operations (the compile itself really fast, less than 1s for 36dcace -- using gcc 9.3.0). 

Next we're gonna benchmark comb sort implementation. But this time we use jit version of ruby 2.7, since it's far way faster (19s vs 26s and 58s vs 66s for string benchmark), for ruby 3.0 we always use jit version since it's faster than non-jit. In case for C (TCC) which doesn't have built-in associative array, I used uthash, because it's the most popular. TinyGo does not complete first benchmark after more than 1000s, sometimes segfault. XS Javascript engine failed to give correct result, engine262 also failed to finish within 1000s.

Language	Command Flags	Version	Assoc	RAM	Num Comb	RAM	Str Comb	RAM	Total	RAM
Go	go run	1.14.7	1.56	257,440	0.73	82,844	4.74	245,432	7.03	585,716
Go	go run	1.15.6	1.73	256,620	0.78	82,896	4.86	245,468	7.37	584,984
Nim	nim r -d:release --gc:arc	1.4.2	1.56	265,172	0.79	79,284	5.77	633,676	8.12	978,132
Nim	nim r -d:release --gc:orc	1.4.2	1.53	265,160	0.94	79,380	5.83	633,636	8.30	978,176
Javascript	node	14.15.2	2.21	327,048	0.87	111,972	6.13	351,520	9.21	790,540
Crystal	crystal run --release	0.35.1	1.81	283,648	1.44	146,700	6.09	440,796	9.34	871,144
Javascript	~/.esvu/bin/v8	8.9.201	1.77	177,748	0.89	105,416	6.71	335,236	9.37	618,400
C	tcc -run	0.9.27	2.61	291,912	1.45	80,832	6.40	393,352	10.46	766,096
Java	java	14.0.2 2020-07-14	1.63	545,412	1.50	165,864	7.69	743,572	10.82	1,454,848
Nim	nim r -d:release	1.4.2	1.91	247,456	0.96	79,476	8.38	1,211,116	11.25	1,538,048
Dart	dart	2.10.4	2.91	385,496	1.61	191,916	7.31	616,716	11.83	1,194,128
Python	pypy	7.3.1+dfsg-2	2.19	331,776	2.83	139,740	8.04	522,648	13.06	994,164
Javascript	~/.esvu/bin/chakra	1.11.24.0	2.73	487,400	1.27	102,192	11.27	803,168	15.27	1,392,760
Javascript	~/.esvu/bin/jsc	271117	5.90	593,624	0.68	111,972	9.09	596,088	15.67	1,301,684
V	v -prod run	0.2 32091dd gcc-10.2	4.78	1,469,932	1.86	79,376	14.06	1,560,516	20.70	3,109,824
Lua	luajit	2.1.0-beta3	4.11	250,828	3.76	133,424	12.91	511,196	20.78	895,448
Javascript	~/.esvu/bin/sm	JavaScript-C86.0a1	5.61	378,064	1.40	96,480	13.81	393,376	20.82	867,920
V	v -prod run	0.2 32091dd gcc-9.3	5.05	1,469,936	2.14	79,408	14.62	1,560,484	21.81	3,109,828
Javascript	~/.esvu/bin/graaljs	CE Native 20.3.0	7.78	958,380	4.45	405,900	14.31	911,220	26.54	2,275,500
Go	gopherjs run	1.12-3 (node 14.15.2)	11.76	594,896	2.04	119,604	18.46	397,396	32.26	1,111,896
Nim	nim r	1.4.2	6.60	247,444	3.05	79,332	31.85	1,211,208	41.50	1,537,984
PHP	php	7.4.3	1.34	190,644	10.11	328,452	34.51	641,664	45.96	1,160,760
Ruby	truffleruby	21.1.0-dev-c1517c55	14.54	2,456,156	3.09	453,152	29.27	3,660,284	46.90	6,569,592
Crystal	crystal run	0.35.1	5.69	284,328	12.00	153,828	31.69	441,740	49.38	879,896
Javascript	~/.esvu/bin/quickjs	2020-11-08	3.90	252,484	23.48	80,772	34.80	471,624	62.18	804,880
V	v run	0.2 36dcace gcc-9.3	5.28	1,470,668	6.60	80,232	58.99	1,561,176	70.87	3,112,076
Lua	lua	5.3.3	5.98	366,516	27.26	264,648	46.05	864,300	79.29	1,495,464
Ruby	ruby	2.7.0p0	6.31	371,456	19.29	100,536	58.82	694,560	84.42	1,166,552
Python	python3	3.8.5	5.47	314,564	33.96	404,976	47.79	722,820	87.22	1,442,360
Ruby	jruby	9.2.9.0	7.45	1,878,184	34.11	1,976,844	59.83	7,115,448	101.39	10,970,476
Ruby	ruby	3.0.0p0	5.94	371,832	24.87	92,844	74.32	1,015,096	105.13	1,479,772
Go	tinygo run	0.16.0	999.99	318,148	3.68	300,548	252.34	711,340	1256.01	1,330,036

Golang still the winner (obviously, since it's compiled), then Nim (Compiled), next best JIT or interpreter is NodeJS, Crystal (Compiled, not JIT), v8, followed Java, by TCC (Compiled) Dart, PyPy, V (Compiled, not JIT), LuaJIT, PHP, Ruby, and Python3. The recap spreadsheet can be accessed here. 

FAQ:

1. Why you measure the compile duration too? because developer experience also important (feedback loop), at least for me.

2. Why not warming up the VM first? each implementation have it's own advantage and disadvantage.

3. Why there's no C++, VB.NET, C#, D, Object-Pascal? don't want to compile things (since there's no build and run command in one flag).  

4. Why there's no Kotlin, Scala, Rust, Pony, Swift, Groovy, Julia, Crystal, or Zig? Too lazy to add :3 you can contribute tho (create a pull request, then I'll run the benchmark again as preferabbly as there's precompiled binary/deb/apt/ppa repository for the compiler/interpreter).

Contributors: ilmanzo (Nim, Crystal, D)