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"A language that doesn't need a runtime, like C?"

The language perhaps doesn't, but most actual programs do. I'm definitely not going to write my own standard library just because I can.

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I wasn't advocating one choice or another. It's just the person I replied to just said "JVM ugh", which isn't necessarily reasonable.

A "Runtime" and a "standard library" are different things. There are a lot of (annoying to install) libraries for C.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Windows_library_files...

Now what could the "RT" part possibly mean?

MS are unique in calling their C library a "Runtime library". Commonly, a support system that does GC and other automatic management for managed languages is called a "runtime", and the various common functions available to C program are called a "standard library". The difference is that in C, you can write a program that uses none of the standard library at all, whereas a managed program will use the "runtime" for doing anything at all.

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