I have become interested in C-like languages for performance computing. Can you recommend some alternative programming languages which have the following attributes:
- must be close to the hardware (bit fiddling, pointers or some alternative safe method like references)
- no managed code (no jvm/.net languages)
- has to be really fast (like C)
- must be above ASM level (and yes I am interested in macro languages on top of ASM)
- can be obscure, not very widespread
I am mainly interested in little-known languages.
How about Assembly language, or the D programming language?