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Miguel de Icaza: Swift Godot: Fixing the Multi-million dollar mistake #GodotCon2023

Godot Engine · talk · Watch on YouTube

Game programming & enginesCompilers, interpreters & program analysisPython, Ruby & scripting languages

What it is

Miguel de Icaza's GodotCon 2023 talk on Swift bindings for Godot. He argues that garbage-collector pauses in C# are a persistent problem and that Swift's reference counting avoids them.

Why Hacker News recommends it

Frequently recommended for an experienced game-engine builder's view on why GC pauses are inevitable and why Swift's approach is appealing.

  • 6 people recommended it
  • 7 different months
  • 2 strong recommendations
  • first 2023, last 2026

What HN commenters said

  1. “Miguel De Icaza’s talk on the topic is highly recommended”

    Talk on Swift traction in Godot.

    jlundberg, 2024-03 · Strong recommendation · in “Embedded Swift on the Raspberry Pi Pico”

  2. “here is a really great talk from Miguel de Icaza”

    History of C# in game engines and Swift reference counting.

    zengid, 2023-12 · Recommendation · in “Murder is a pixel art ECS game engine in C#”

  3. “got me interested in Swift. It starts around 12:30”

    Got the commenter interested in Swift; starts around 12:30.

    Decabytes, 2024-01 · Recommendation · in “Apple hiring compiler developers for improving Swift / C++ interoperability”

  4. “Miguel de Icaza gave a great talk on Swift + Godot”

    De Icaza on Swift plus Godot, among other things.

    rescripting, 2024-09 · Recommendation · in “Swift 6”

  5. “Miguel de Icaza gave a nice talk on why noticeable pauses are inevitable”

    Why stop-the-world tracing GC pauses are inevitable; Swift reference counting alternative.

    perennialmind, 2025-07 · Recommendation · in “.NET 10 Preview 6 brings JIT improvements, one-shot tool execution”

  6. “Highly recommend.”

    De Icaza talk on Swift Godot and GC problems.

    KolmogorovComp, 2026-07 · Recommendation · in “Watching Go's new garbage collector move through the heap”

Excerpts from Hacker News comments, linked to the originals. Summaries and labels were written by a language model from those comments.

Topics: swift, godot, garbage collection, c#, reference counting, game engines

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