All applications built with any programming language run on top of an operating system, which in turn runs on hardware. In server environments, Linux dominates, and Intel CPUs are the most common hardware platform.

Running commands on most company servers will show a typical Linux OS/Intel CPU configuration. The instruction set includes familiar names like MMX, SYSCALL, FPU, AVX, AVX512, SSE, SSE2, and CPUID. Open-source projects such as PHP with Swoole, the Java JVM, and MySQL all rely on these underlying components.

Without an operating system and hardware CPU, no programming language can execute. Application developers typically don't pay much attention to OS and CPU changes, but every instruction in our software ultimately runs on a CPU. Operating systems expose a set of interfaces called system calls that software engineers use. These system call interfaces are implemented in asembly language and remain remarkably stable over time. Once you master them, they remain applicable until Linux and Intel CPUs become obsolete. Linux has been around since 1991, and the x86 architecture dates back to 1985, with x64 emerging in 2000—yet the fundamental system functions and instruction sets have remained consistent. New instructions get added, but for application-layer developers, there's little practical impact.

New programming languages like Huawei's Cengjie work the same way. Their foundation rests on these decades-old system calls and instruction sets.

In web development, data transmission is the core concern. This relies on the TCP/IP protocol, and the system function enterface for TCP/IP is the SOCKET API. Mastering socket programming means understanding the foundation of web applications—databases, caches, middleware, and applications built in any language.

Consider this Cangjie network program demonstrating the underlying mechanisms:

from std import socket.*
from std import time.*
from std import sync.*

let SERVER_PORT: UInt16 = 8080

func runTcpServer() {
    try (serverSocket = TcpServerSocket(bindAt: SERVER_PORT)) {
        serverSocket.bind()
        try (client = serverSocket.accept()) {
            let buf = Array<Byte>(10, item: 0)
            let count = client.read(buf)
            println("Server read ${count} bytes: ${buf}")
        }
    }
}

main(): Int64 {
    spawn {
        runTcpServer()
    }
    sleep(Duration.millisecond * 500)
    try (socket = TcpSocket("127.0.0.1", SERVER_PORT)) {
        socket.connect()
        socket.write(Array<Byte>([1, 2, 3]))
    }
    return 0
}

Using strace to trace system calls reveals what actually happens under the hood:

[pid 26567] execve("./target/release/bin/main", ["./target/release/bin/main"], 0x55f07661e1e0 /* 21 vars */) = 0
[pid 26589] socket(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM|SOCK_CLOEXEC|SOCK_NONBLOCK, IPPROTO_IP) = 3
[pid 26589] bind(3, {sa_family=AF_INET, sin_port=htons(8080), sin_addr=inet_addr("0.0.0.0")}, 16) = 0
[pid 26589] listen(3, 1024)             = 0
[pid 26589] epoll_ctl(4, EPOLL_CTL_ADD, 3, {EPOLLIN|EPOLLOUT|EPOLLRDHUP|EPOLLET, {u32=1856134560, u64=94091704688032}}) = 0
[pid 26593] epoll_wait(4, [{EPOLLIN|EPOLLOUT|EPOLLRDHUP, {u32=3556772976, u64=140629375978608}}], 64, 10) = 1
[pid 26593] epoll_wait(4,  <unfinished ...>
[pid 26594] write(1, "Server read 3 bytes: [1, 2, 3, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0]\n", 52) = 52
[pid 26594] epoll_ctl(4, EPOLL_CTL_DEL, 6, 0x55936e9fcb90) = 0
[pid 26594] epoll_ctl(4, EPOLL_CTL_DEL, 3, 0x55936e9fcb90) = 0
[pid 26593] <... epoll_wait resumed> [], 64, 10) = 0
[pid 26593] exit(0)

The system calls should look familiar: socket() creates an IPv4 socket, bind() attaches it to an address and port, listen() puts it in server mode, and epoll_ctl/epoll_wait handle event-driven I/O. The write() call outputs the final message, and exit() terminates the process.

Understanding these underlying system calls makes learning new programming languages straightforward. Whether picking up Cangjie, Rust, or any other language for web programming, the foundation remains the same. This knowledge applies universally and doesn't become outdated.

Understanding the fundamentals means understanding everything—all variations of programming languages share this common ground. This foundation is invaluable for troubleshooting web applications, debugging issues, optimizing performance, and comprehending how projects actually execute.

The key insight: learn once, apply everywhere.