Introducing Hike: Another Go compiler carried out 100% in Go, for zero-runtime, tiny Wasm, and Cgo-free native libraries – Releases

1. Prompt, Zero-Overhead C-ABI Calls: Calling C through Cgo incurs substantial overhead (goroutine stack switching, sign dealing with, scheduler interplay) and severely impairs seamless cross-compilation.

2. Tiny Wasm Payloads with Zero Heap Drift: Normal Go Wasm binaries bundle the runtime and GC, simply ballooning to a number of megabytes and producing regular heap allocation.

3. Packaging Complicated Native Desktop/Graphics Libraries: Dynamic extraction tips (like dropping embedded .dll/.so recordsdata to /tmp at runtime) are more and more blocked by trendy enterprise AV/EDR software program or hardened noexec mounts.

In Hike, calling native C capabilities requires zero glue code, wrapper layers, or Cgo. You merely write normal Go-style perform declarations:

Go

// Direct C-ABI name lowered to a local machine instruction
func abs(n int32) int32

Hike additionally compiles immediately into native shared libraries (.so / .dll), mechanically producing full, fully-typed C++ header recordsdata prepared for exterior toolchains.

When concentrating on WebAssembly, Hike emits clear, compact binaries:

• Base binary sizes begin at ~1.4KB.

• Executes 10,000+ steady perform calls with zero heap reminiscence development, making certain rock-solid predictability.

• Contains a built-in DWARF emitter, offering step-through line debugging immediately inside Chrome DevTools with out counting on heavy exterior toolchains.

Hike leverages Go’s native static object specification (.sxso). By automating the bridge between prebuilt C++/Rust static archives and .sxso objects, Hike permits seamless, Cgo-free static compilation inside normal Go tasks.

We have now already used this system to ship absolutely working, Cgo-free Go bindings for main trendy GUI and system libraries:

• Slint (Declarative UI framework)

• wgpu (WebGPU native implementation)

• winit (Cross-platform window creation)

• SDL3

Hike shouldn’t be an adversarial mission. It’s a complementary instrument designed to increase what Go builders can construct, permitting them to carry Go’s clear syntax and engineering effectivity into domains the place heavy runtimes can not survive: microcontrollers, edge nodes, real-time GUI functions, and bandwidth-constrained Wasm sandboxes.