If some code A performs the same task as code B, but using just half the RAM, then I’d say A performs better than B: I would never say:-
“A is more performant than B” or
“A displayed greater performantcy than B” or
“The performantce of A was superior to that of B.”
After all, A could just as well be a a Tesla Model S P100D and B could be a Porsche 918 Spyder. Then A would be more “performant” than B in terms of top speed, but less “performant” in terms of acceleration: see this article.
Car performance is just one topic – along with physics, biology, genetics, etc. – that has successfully struggled by for a century or more without the need for this new word. Why is it only CS that feels the need for a neologism?
Obviously, the reason why I mentioned the performantce of cars was to show that CS creates neologisms at an unnecessarily and unusually high rate, whereas other subjects manage by using recursive nature of English grammar. (Most (Chomskian) linguists regard the existence of a recursive grammar as the defining characteristic of a language, English included!)
Methinks ScotPJones is closer to the mark
P.S. I’m not against jargon where it’s needed. For example, another thread here talks about covariant, contravariant and invariant Types, which is fine as it’s simply jargon borrowed from category theory. I’m less keen about “performant” as it’s jargon for jargon’s sake.
