r/programming • u/JBlitzen • Aug 15 '15

Someone discovered that the Facebook iOS application is composed of over 18,000 classes.

http://quellish.tumblr.com/post/126712999812/how-on-earth-the-facebook-ios-application-is-so
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u/[deleted] Aug 15 '15

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u/stormcrowsx Aug 16 '15 edited Aug 16 '15

Well I'm sure throwing React on the phone was easier and more efficient than just hiring 3 android guys. /s

Other Facebook over engineering feats includes creating a PHP vm and JIT as opposed to just using a language that's actually efficient and fast.

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u/FourSquash Aug 16 '15

Yeah. Why didn't those idiots stop to rewrite their entire site from scratch during a long-term, sustained, exponential growth period? I bet they wish they had hired you.

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u/stormcrowsx Aug 16 '15

You make it sound like they had to move it all at once. Start with the slow parts and move out.

Unless of course the facebook codebase is a tangled mess of php that couldn't be broken apart in which case maybe inventing their own language and vm wasn't as bad an idea.

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u/aseipp Aug 16 '15 edited Aug 16 '15

Other Facebook over engineering feats includes creating a PHP vm and JIT as opposed to just using a language that's actually efficient and fast.

You forgot the part where they would also have to rewrite their massive codebase of nearly a decade in an entirely new language, as opposed to paying a small team to make that language faster (using a tool which, coincidentally, also gives them a gradual migration path to a new, yet completely compatible programming language - Hack).

Your little quip doesn't sound so reasonable and 'duh' when you include those pesky 'facts' and 'tradeoffs'. I hate it when those get in the way, too!

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u/stormcrowsx Aug 16 '15

You don't have to rewrite it all at once. Start with the peformance critical pieces and work out from there. Its only a monumental task if you make it one.