I am working on Flogram, a programming language, designed to be perfect for writing blockchain projects. And I don't mean a language for smart contracts, though it probably could be used there too, I'm more talking about a language for say building a blockchain or miner or wallet or torrent downloader or other decentralized projects, etc.
First and foremost, good luck on your project!
- If I make trade-offs would you prefer performance or security? I'm thinking security by default allow using a keyword to opt out to allow improving performance via undefined behavior or
Security, security, security. *cue the ballmer gif*
- What features do you most value in programming languages in general?
#1, The Rust ownership model. I can easily use random libraries, multiple threads, old code I forgot what I meant when I wrote it, etc., and never have to worry about who owns what. If it compiles, 99% of the bugs have already been eliminated.
#2, Type inference. I'm lazy. When I define a vector, I don't want to specify the type, because I know I'll only be inserting Ints into it. If I later decide it needs to be Floats, I don't need to update the definition. The compiler will enforce static typing. Just say no to dynamic typing.
#3, Helpful compiler warning/errors. Again, Rust is a fine example. It doesn't just point out the errors, it offers relevant fixes.
Now, the punchline. You can't beat Rust. I know, I'm the asshole. You're competing with the entire Rust ecosystem. You need SSL? There's a crate for that. You need PRNG? There's a crate for that. If you have some good crypto/blockchain ideas in mind, implement them in Rust and publish the crates.