RubyConf 2017: Improving TruffleRuby’s Startup Time with the SubstrateVM by Kevin Menard

Improving TruffleRuby’s Startup Time with the SubstrateVM by Kevin Menard

Ruby applications can be broadly split into two categories: those that run for a short period and those that stick around for a while. Optimizing performance for one often comes at the expense of the other. Over the years, alternative Ruby implementations have demonstrated remarkable performance gains for long-lived applications -- so-called peak performance -- but often lose out to MRI for short-lived applications.

In this talk, I'll introduce the SubstrateVM and show how we use it to massively improve TruffleRuby's startup time with minimal impact on peak performance.

[dipi]

Having used Ruby since 2003 for all my main needs, I’ve never heard of Truffle, Graal, SVM (although I did try Rubinius and JRuby once). So thanks to Kevin Menard for this talk and for bringing all this progress to the attention of a wider audience. Cheers!