2023 · lightning
Java must be faster, time for the Vector API
Java is a flexible, powerful, and widely used programming language. It gets flack for being arcane, bloated, and encouraging strange programming practices. These accusations are well earned. Yet, advancements in the last couple of years show that the language has a future. Java is slowly becoming modern. One of the most exciting and recent advancements is project Panama's Vector API. This brings CPU Single Instruction Multiple Data (SIMD) into the JVM. Allowing more performant and powerful programs. Project Panama is especially relevant for the new Vector Search and large language model world. This talk will be a short overview of SIMD, a small demo, and the hoops required when bringing them into Lucene (with benchmarks!). Let's all hope Java keeps advancing!