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China Programming

Programmers Complain that Huawei's Ark Compiler is 'Not Even Half-Finished' (abacusnews.com) 42

Posted by msmash from the closer-look dept.
A scam. A publicity stunt. Premature. These are just a few of the things Chinese developers are saying about the release of Huawei's supposed secret weapon: The Ark Compiler. From a report: Developers are even claiming the program feels incomplete. The reception has been so bad that one programmer told Abacus that he wondered whether it was released just for publicity. "Maybe they're doing it to help in the PR and trade war, adding leverage against the US," said Max Zhou, co-founder of app-enhancement company MetaApp and former head of engineering at Mobike. The Ark Compiler is a key component of Huawei's new operating system, HarmonyOS. The tool is meant to allow developers to quickly port their Android apps to the new OS, ideally helping to quickly bridge the gap of app availability. It is also said to be able to improve the efficiency of Android apps, making them as smooth as apps on iOS. As of right now, though, developers say promises are too good to be true.
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Programmers Complain that Huawei's Ark Compiler is 'Not Even Half-Finished' More

Programmers Complain that Huawei's Ark Compiler is 'Not Even Half-Finished'

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  • or it's just something new and need more work (Score:3, Informative)

    by iggymanz ( 596061 ) on Wednesday September 18, 2019 @06:08PM (#59210638)

    I can think of plenty of successful compilers and other tools that got off to half-assed rocky start but became hugely successful. For example, gcc was a shit pile under Stallman but others beat that bitch into great shape

    • Well it’s one thing to claim something is in early stages like beta or even alpha when releasing it. People who use it can assume there development is not complete. The article has a claim that Huawei says its 3 stars whatever that means which implies that it is ready for use.

      • Do you work with software for a living? Just as example, the major releases of Oracle take over a year to get the kinks out, sane people first roll them out in test systems. Microsoft Windows 10, the kinks are ongoing. IBM Websphere, oh my.

        Yeah, it's par for the course for release of new thing to have more bugs than Bangkok whore's crotch.

        • At no point did I say that released = 100% bug free. I said if something is in beta or alpha developers understand that development is not complete and it could be lacking in important functions.. Huawei did not say this about their compiler. They said it’s “3 stars” implying it is ready to use when it is definitely alpha.

          • uh, those major releases of Oracle do things like lose all your fucking data before they get all the kinks out in over a year...

            comparison is quite apt

    • I can think of plenty of successful compilers and other tools that got off to half-assed rocky start but became hugely successful.

      But that was 30 years ago. Maybe that compiler will be a decent success 30 years from now.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

      I can think of plenty of successful compilers and other tools that got off to half-assed rocky start but became hugely successful. For example, gcc was a shit pile under Stallman but others beat that bitch into great shape

      But that was only because the alternative was expensive compilers that cost many thousands of dollars, and were equally bad.

      MS-DOS was one of the few platforms where compilers started getting higher quality, better and cheaper, dropping from thousands to $500 to Borland pretty much killing

  • "Compiler"? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by sexconker ( 1179573 ) on Wednesday September 18, 2019 @06:21PM (#59210680)

    Why are they calling it a "compiler"? It's for porting Android apps to Huawei's OS. Let's be real. It's Java to Java for most apps.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Why are they calling it a "compiler"?

      Because that is what it is.

      It's Java to Java for most apps.

      No it compiles to native AArch64 binaries [cnx-software.com].

      • Most Android apps are not natively compiled. Apps supporting the newer APIs only may be, but most Android apps are still Java (but don't ever admit that in court) that the Android OS may sort of half compile and cache on their first load in an attempt to make them not be butt slow.

        • Most Android apps are not natively compiled.

          To my knowledge, ever since ART, they are.

        • Most Android apps are not natively compiled. Apps supporting the newer APIs only may be, but most Android apps are still Java (but don't ever admit that in court) that the Android OS may sort of half compile and cache on their first load in an attempt to make them not be butt slow.

          Since ART was introduced in Android 5.0 (Lollipop), all Android apps are compiled to native machine code. Some apps (mostly games) are written initially in languages like C++ that compile to native and the .APKs for those contain machine code. Most are written in Java (and now Kotlin) and compiled to Java bytecode, which is what is in the .APK, but when you install the .APK on the device, ART compiles it to native machine code. By the time you run the app, it's native code.

          Note that ahead-of-time (AOT)

    • Think about this, it's clearly not Java to Java. Where are you going to get the source?

      JVM bytecode or Dalvik/ART translated to anything else is a compiler. In this case we can classify Ark as an AOT compiler.

  • Perhaps the company is taking their cue from Windows 10.

  • Why would anyone want an open source compiler? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by craighansen ( 744648 ) on Wednesday September 18, 2019 @06:43PM (#59210750) Journal

    TFA asks why anyone would want an open source compiler. It should be apparent that with all the security concerns surrounding Huawei, making it open source helps to ensure that there are no "Compiler Backdoors." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
    On the other hand, it's worth noting that such backdoors can also be hidden into an original binary used to bootstrap the compiler, so an open source compiler must also be bootstrapped from a known-good compiler, preferably one small enough to be checked by human eyeballs. The wiki article also discusses another method, described as "Diverse Double-Compiling," to compare the output of diverse compilers, to eliminate the possibility of a compiler backdoor, which IMHO could only verify that either both or neither compilers are backdoored.

    • That comment is particularly scary. More correct question would be "why would anyone want a closed source compiler"?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by isj ( 453011 )

        Because they can contain technologies/algorithms that are useful and not available in open-source compilers. Eg. language bindings to OS-specific APIs, nifty hardware-specific syntax, optimizations, language extensions, better diagnostics, ...

        Closed-source compilers were the norm for PCs for many years (Borland, Zortec, Metaware, IBM, Microsoft, Watcom, Intel, ...).

        Yes, Huawei could make a backdoored compiler, but given that it is meant for their proprietary HarmonyOS where it would be easier to hide back

        • Nah. If Huawei wants a backdoor they just ask their buddy to put shit in physically, at the factory.

        • By making them closed source you pretty much make anything useful that it might have less useful. So my question stands.
    • Or, your open source compiler could be bootstrapped by using an interpreter. Which is slow but a one-time activity.

      • And what do you use to compile, load, and run the interpreter, after carefully vetting the interpreter itself?

    • Before using Huawei's compiker, check out Ken Thompson's 1984 speech, "Reflections on Trusting Trust."

  • Josh Ye said of the United States government's most recent attempts to further discredit and devalue China's leading handset maker...

  • The tool might have more possibilities once the OS is in the wild. Never mind that it's a tool in a proxy war over theft of IP right now, but a true open source tool can be a way to get the Android world away from fragmentation if it can be used to do what it is intended to.
  • This whole thing reeks of a weird PR stunt to me...

    • Or Huawei had to release it a lot earlier than intended because of an infantile leader on another country has cut off the suppliers to them.

      • IT IS SOFTWARE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And who the heck takes 10 years to write a compiler???
        • If it's open source they could just rip off most of it from LLVM/GCC if they wanted to. Or one of the other million open source compiler and compiler libraries...

  • It's not half finished it's early access (Score:3)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Wednesday September 18, 2019 @07:28PM (#59210880)
    Just wait until they add loot boxes in the 1.5 release.

  • “Nobody wants to change their compiler code in the first place,” he said. “It’s a compiler for god’s sake.”

    why are app developers so mediocre?

  • I bet some PHB* high in China's gov't said, "I don't want to hear technical excuses, we need this active to further the Greatness of China. Release it ASAP!"

    * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

  • definition (Score:3)

    by guygo ( 894298 ) on Wednesday September 18, 2019 @08:05PM (#59210982)
    Ark is nearly the definition of "vaporware". None of this is going to actually work, it's just supposed to look like it works well enough to separate the marks from their cash.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Given that the compiler is open source and cost $0, it's not clear how the "marks" are being separated from their cash.

      They are complaining that it's not easy enough to port their software to Harmony OS using the compiler. Huawei needs apps to make their OS successful. The development kit is free too, the developer only has to pay if they want to be on the Huawei app store. I don't know what the cost is but presumably it's in line with what Google and Apple charge... I think $100 for Apple, Google last time

  • What were they thinking (Score:5, Funny)

    by jrumney ( 197329 ) on Wednesday September 18, 2019 @09:07PM (#59211142)

    This is shocking. It is completely unheard of in the software industry for vendors to ship half finished products that don't live up to the promises made by marketing.

  • They gave away the source code. If you're so fucking smart then fork it instead of bitching about it.

  • (The tool) is also said to be able to improve the efficiency of Android apps, making them as smooth as apps on iOS.

    Do they officially mention it as one of the project goals? If so, I'm sure both Google and Apple are impressed.

  • wtf does "the program feels incomplete" mean, exactly?

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