Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

What makes you think the BEAM VM is "heavy"?

It's almost like an OS in itself and initially designed to be like a more capable and robust OS on top of rather constrained computers. In my experience it's trivial to shell or port out to the environment when I want to, and I also see people that I don't think of as highly skilled low-level programmers do things with NIF:s so that can't be exceptionally demanding either.



Yes it's definitely not heavy like a Java program that will cannibalize your RAM.

It's actually quite lean.

It will use all your cores without you asking (which is fantastic right?) but it's configurable AFAIK.


It will also use preemptive multitasking, so busy processes won't pin CPU cores at the expense of other tasks.




Consider applying for YC's Winter 2026 batch! Applications are open till Nov 10

Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: