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I actually don't mean to bag on the author, but I think my complaint is valid. Maybe if they had a note right next to the curl command that said "This installs a single bun bundled executable. Here's a link to the GitHub releases if you'd like to install it yourself", that would be helpful.

My point about interpreted languages stands though. These bundled javascript runtime "apps" eat at least 500M of RAM on boot. That's totally not needed for a CLI tool. If it's not bundled, then it's even worse as you hit the supply chain and tooling interference problems (and you still use the same RAM). There are a lot of good, modern, compiled languages. CLI builders should pick up those stacks imho.

1 comments

In case the author is, like so many people, sensitive to this kind of criticism, I will say this:

Thank you for giving the world your free software. Feel no compunction to undertake extra work to please people who criticize your work. They are not paying for your software and are not paying your bills. If your install eats enormous amounts of ram or uses a programming language they do not like, that is their problem. In your case for example they are free to get Bloomberg.

If you want to do free work to please critical people, ok. But I wouldn’t bother. Thank you for all the work you did to write your software and then the even more work you did to share it. I write my own software but don’t bother sharing it because it’s a lot of work, so I appreciate you.

I don’t know, man. Maybe if they’re that sensitive to criticism they should leave the industry.

This kind of hug boxing might have been fine five years ago during the ZIRP era, but in an age where two sticks of RAM is becoming $800 (and data centers are causing dirty sin power that can wear down electronics), I think the developers have a duty to be efficient with their programs and to do what is necessary to not ship a 500 MB ram sink with every single app.

It is frankly unforgivable and it’s a drain on the skill of the industry to just say “yeah no man it’s OK. It’s OK don’t worry don’t worry about your app being completely inefficient and a drain on your users resources. Don’t worry about it. Your app is so good that nobody will ever be using any other application on their PC“

Is this developer paying for my RAM? I run local models on consumer hardware. I can’t afford a 500mb of RAM for a CLI app. Thank you for that. Thank you for writing your CLI software in a way that I have to close it in order to use other parts of my computer.

Not to mention interpreted languages are slower than compiled languages, and we are talking about a financial terminal. Talk about not even understanding the functional requirements of the thing you are building. I might go get Bloomberg terminal instead of this just because I know it’s gonna actually be faster and make me money. This might actually lose me money.

Just because they built an application that “competes” with a closed source tool does not mean that their open source tool is good or worth adopting.

I mean, have some respect for and actual thought about who your end user is.

Imagine in the 80s or 90s telling a software developer not worry about porting their Amiga fintech application to another architecture like sparc. Imagine telling a developer in the 90s and 00s not to worry about browser compatibility and thanking them for making it only for IE to protect their fragile ego.

Imagine telling the creators of UNIX “yeah, no PDP 11 is good. You could stop there anyone who wants to run it on a different architecture is just an ingrate who doesn’t respect the effort you put in.” Because they already did so much work.

This is a farce. GP had a valid constructive criticism and a valid input worth considering when you take into account the functional requirements of a financial terminal.

Just because you are willing to cut corners on things that you don’t release does not mean that it is OK to release a piece of software with cut corners. But you know that, or you would release your software. I’m certainly projecting because I know that that’s why I write tools for myself that I don’t publish, but even then I use compiled languages and go out of my way to avoid JavaScript type script, python, and all of that.

But if this project were to ever take off and they were to monetize or start charging enterprise licenses the very first thing I would ask for is the compiled version that doesn’t rely on interpreted languages or a 500 MB node folder.