Websites using Erlang

Okay, let s break down Erlang, covering its overview, revenue (or lack thereof), alternatives, pricing (also typically free), and customer care considerations.

Erlang Overview

• What it is: Erlang is a concurrent, fault-tolerant, and distributed programming language and runtime environment. It s designed for building systems that need to be highly available and handle large numbers of concurrent processes. It was originally developed by Ericsson for telecommunications applications.
• Key Features:
  • Concurrency: Built-in support for lightweight processes (much lighter than OS threads) that can run in parallel. Message passing is the primary mechanism for communication between these processes.
  • Fault Tolerance: Erlang employs the let it crash philosophy. Processes are isolated, so if one crashes, it doesn t bring down the entire system. Supervision trees automatically restart failed processes.
  • Distribution: Designed for running across multiple machines. Processes can communicate transparently regardless of their location.
  • Hot Code Swapping: Allows updating code without stopping the system. Critical for applications that require continuous uptime.
  • Functional Programming: Erlang is a functional language, which promotes immutability and reduces side effects, making code easier to reason about and test.
  • Pattern Matching: A powerful feature for concisely handling different data structures and messages.
  • BEAM (Bogdan/Björn s Erlang Abstract Machine): The virtual machine that executes Erlang code. It s optimized for concurrency and fault tolerance.
• Use Cases:
  • Telecommunications: Its original domain (e.g., switches, routing systems).
  • Messaging Systems: RabbitMQ, for example, is built in Erlang.
  • Real-time Systems: Systems requiring low latency and high reliability.
  • Blockchain: Some blockchain platforms leverage Erlang s concurrency and fault-tolerance capabilities.
  • Gaming: Used for building server-side game logic that needs to handle many concurrent players.
  • eCommerce: handling large amount of concurrent requests.
• Strengths:
  • Excellent concurrency model.
  • Robust fault tolerance mechanisms.
  • Scalability and distribution capabilities.
  • Hot code swapping for minimal downtime.
• Weaknesses:
  • Steep learning curve, especially for developers used to imperative or object-oriented programming.
  • Syntax can be unfamiliar to some.
  • Debugging concurrent systems can be challenging (though Erlang provides tools).
  • Performance can be slower than some languages for certain types of CPU-bound tasks (though its strength lies in I/O-bound and concurrent workloads).

Revenue

• Erlang itself is open-source and free to use. There is no direct revenue stream from the language or runtime environment.
• Indirect Revenue: Companies that use Erlang to build products or services generate revenue from those products/services. For example, Ericsson (the original creator) uses Erlang in its telecommunications infrastructure, which generates revenue. Companies that offer support, consulting, or training services related to Erlang also generate revenue. Also, those offering products built in Erlang generate revenue.
• Erlang Ecosystem Foundation: While not directly revenue-generating, the Erlang Ecosystem Foundation is a non-profit organization that supports the development and promotion of Erlang and related technologies (like Elixir). It relies on sponsorships and donations.

Alternatives

Here s a breakdown of alternatives, categorized by the problem they aim to solve:

• Concurrency/Parallelism:
  • Go: Excellent concurrency with goroutines and channels. Easier to learn than Erlang for many developers. Good performance.
  • Java (with Akka): Akka provides an actor model implementation in Java (and Scala) similar to Erlang s.
  • Elixir: A functional language that runs on the Erlang VM (BEAM). It provides a more modern syntax and tooling while leveraging Erlang s concurrency and fault tolerance. Often considered a more approachable alternative.
  • Kotlin (with Coroutines): Coroutines offer a lightweight concurrency model in Kotlin.
  • Rust (with Tokio): Rust provides strong concurrency support with its ownership and borrowing system and the Tokio asynchronous runtime. Excellent performance and memory safety.
• Fault Tolerance:
  • Languages with robust error handling and monitoring frameworks: Java, Python, etc., can achieve fault tolerance through careful design, exception handling, monitoring, and restart mechanisms. However, they often require more manual effort than Erlang s built-in supervisors.
  • Microservices Architectures: Breaking down applications into smaller, independent services can improve fault isolation.
• Distributed Systems:
  • Kubernetes: An orchestration system for managing containerized applications across a cluster.
  • Apache Kafka: A distributed streaming platform for building real-time data pipelines and streaming applications.
  • Apache Cassandra: A distributed NoSQL database.
  • Other languages with libraries/frameworks for distributed computing: Python with libraries like dask, Java with frameworks like Apache Spark.
• Real-time Systems:
  • C/C++: Often used for performance-critical real-time systems where low-level control and minimal overhead are required.
  • Ada: A language designed for high-reliability and real-time systems.
  • Real-time Java: Java implementations optimized for real-time performance.

The best alternative depends heavily on the specific requirements of your project. Consider factors like performance needs, team expertise, existing infrastructure, and desired level of fault tolerance.

Pricing

• Erlang is free and open-source. You can download and use it without any licensing fees. The Erlang/OTP distribution is typically licensed under the Apache License 2.0.
• Costs: While the language itself is free, you will incur costs related to:
  • Hardware: Servers to run your Erlang applications.
  • Development time: Developer salaries.
  • Training: If your team needs to learn Erlang.
  • Support: If you choose to pay for commercial support.
  • Infrastructure: Cloud services, monitoring tools, etc.

Customer Care Details

Erlang doesn t have a traditional customer care department like a commercial software vendor. Here s how you typically get support:

• Open-Source Community:
  • Mailing Lists: The Erlang mailing lists are a primary source of help and information.
  • Forums: Stack Overflow (tagged with erlang ) and other online forums.
  • IRC Channels: Often used for real-time discussions.
  • GitHub: The Erlang/OTP repository on GitHub is used for bug reports, feature requests, and contributing to the language. Many Erlang libraries and frameworks are also hosted on GitHub.
• Commercial Support:
  • Erlang Solutions: Offers commercial support, training, and consulting services for Erlang and related technologies.
  • Other Consulting Companies: Many consulting firms specialize in Erlang development and can provide support and expertise.
• Documentation:
  • The official Erlang documentation is comprehensive and includes tutorials, reference manuals, and design principles.

Key Takeaways for Customer Care:

• Community-Driven: Erlang support is primarily driven by its active and helpful open-source community.
• Self-Service: Start by searching online resources, reading documentation, and trying to solve the problem yourself.
• Be Specific: When asking for help, provide clear and concise information about the problem you re facing, including code snippets, error messages, and the Erlang version you re using.
• Consider Commercial Support: If you need guaranteed response times, expert assistance, or enterprise-level support, consider a commercial support provider.
• Erlang Ecosystem Foundation: Helps to support the community and ecosystem. Consider supporting them.

In summary, Erlang is a powerful tool for building concurrent, fault-tolerant, and distributed systems. While it s free to use, remember to factor in the costs of development, training, and potential support. The community is your primary source of help, but commercial options are available for more demanding requirements.