hello_world.js

console.log("hello world!");

hello_world.lua

print "hello world!"

hello_world.php

<?php print "hello world!" ?>

hello_world.pl

print "hello world!"

hello_world.rb

puts "hello world!"

output.txt

$ ./run.sh 
node ===
hello world!

real	0m0.067s
user	0m0.042s
sys	0m0.020s

lua ====
hello world!

real	0m0.004s
user	0m0.001s
sys	0m0.002s

php ===
hello world!
real	0m0.059s
user	0m0.037s
sys	0m0.014s

perl ===
hello world!
real	0m0.013s
user	0m0.003s
sys	0m0.005s

ruby ===
hello world!

real	0m0.014s
user	0m0.007s
sys	0m0.005s

run.sh

#!/usr/bin/env bash

echo "node ==="
time node hello_world.js
echo ""

echo "lua ===="
time lua hello_world.lua
echo ""

echo "php ==="
time php hello_world.php
echo ""

echo "perl ==="
time perl hello_world.pl
echo ""

echo "ruby ==="
time ruby hello_world.rb
echo ""

Isn't this an unfair benchmark?
Node probably has much more bootstrapping operations than ruby... server infrastructure X pure interpreter?

maybe so, I dont know. I am just trying to find a script language that run small scripts fast, so bootstrapping may be important.
I just added some more languages and it seems lua is the winner for now.

I like this kind of stuff, just for fun :)