Linux people doing Linux things, it seems.
Here’s the thing: you’re not going to force all of us to learn Rust.
That’s precious coming from Linux developers.
I am a heavy Linux user. I run multiple microservices on multiple headless devices all Linux.
This sounds like every fucking Windows user you’ll ever encounter.
“Here’s the thing: you’re not going to force all of us to learn to use Linux.”
So, yeah…
It’s just their ego showing through.
It basically now comes down to the current devs depending on new Rust devs for anything that interacts with Rust code.
They could just work together with Rust devs to solve any issues (API for example).
But their ego doesn’t allow for it. They want to do everything by themselves because that’s how it always was (up until now).
Sure, you could say it’s more efficient to work on things alone for some people, and I’d agree here, but realistically that’s not going to matter because the most interactivity that exists (at the moment) between Rust and C in Linux is… the API. Something that they touch up on once in a while. Once it’s solid enough, they don’t have to touch it anymore at all.
This is a completely new challenge that the Linux devs are facing now after a new language has been introduced. It was tried before, but now it’s been approved. The only person they should be mad at is Linus, not the Rust devs.
I finally watched the talk today and that wasn’t what I thought he meant. What I thought he was getting at was that the rust parts of the kernel interact with lots of other modules written by people who don’t know rust. When those C modules change their semantics in ways that break the rust code, they can’t go fix it because they don’t know rust. In fact, whenever they make a change, they don’t even know if they broke some rust module, because they don’t understand the rust code well enough. And this is something that everyone is going to have to live with for the foreseeable future, because you can’t force all those other kernel hackers to learn rust.
If you are that good in C(pp), I guess understanding rust code of a module is not sooo hard… I mean, I learned what I know about C from reading stuff in the Kernel that made my embedded Linux project not working.
But I have yet to read rust.
It’s a whole different ballgame. I’ve written a good amount of C and C++ in my day. I’ve been learning Rust for a year or so now. Switching between allocating your own memory and managing it, and the concept of “Ownership” https://doc.rust-lang.org/book/ch04-01-what-is-ownership.html is just something many devs set in their ways aren’t willing to do.
I understand where they’re coming from, I’ve gone through massive refactors with new tech in my career. I think this approach needs to be more methodical and cautious than it is, but I don’t think they are correct in the end result. I think a memory-safe language is the way to go, and it needs to happen.
This to me is a classic software project with no manager and a bunch of devs arguing internally with no clear external goals. There needs to be definitive goals set over a timeline. If someone doesn’t agree after a consensus is reached they can leave the project. But as of now I think as others have said this is 80% infighting, 20% actual work that’s happening.
Switching everything from C to Rust because it has better memory safety is more akin to changing languages from English to Esperanto because it has gender neutral pronouns and other cool features. Maybe it’s a good idea, but it’s understandable that some people are reluctant.
Maybe it’s a good idea, but it’s understandable that some people are reluctant.
I understand that position. I also understand how the words and phrases that the C community has used to communicate with the Rust community seems to be completely dismissive, not just reluctant.
I quoted what I did explicitly because of how a statement like that comes off to the person it’s aimed at. It doesn’t make them feel like they’re on an even footing working on the same project with the overall goal of it becoming better.
memory safety is more akin to changing languages from English to Esperanto because it has gender neutral pronouns.
I mean… not at all? Memory safety is huge for cybersecurity, buffer overflows and the like are common attack surfaces. C requires you to have deep knowledge of safe memory management practices and even then you can end up with memory issues. Rust was developed to avoid such issues entirely. I understand the reluctance but it feels to me like arguing “we should just stick with COBOL because it works.”
People prefer what’s familiar to them. Rust is completely foreign to them, the syntax is very different, the community is different (and often much younger), it still has many issues and is not ubiquitous, and many people are just slow/averse to change in general. So I absolutely understand the hesitation. And some just don’t like it for other reasons like the syntax, learning curve or other reasons. There’s also still a host of memory-related things Rust doesn’t fix like stack overflows, leaks, bitflips, unsafe context code, and just bad coding practices in general.
Gender neutral pronouns are pretty huge too. Sure you can do them in English without too many problems usually, just as it’s also possible to code safely in C. It requires everyone to change their old habits, but it’s much less of a change than is involved in adopting a whole new language.
Anyway, I do like Rust better personally.
I understand the reluctance but it feels to me like arguing “we should just stick with COBOL because it works.”
For those depending on COBOL code that does the job and has been doing it just well for a few decades, there are approximately zero good reasons to not stick with it.
Vast majority of the cybersecurity community: “an absolute ton of exploits come from memory safety issues with C/C++, we should move to memory safe languages like Rust to greatly reduce security risk and make everyone safer”
You: “Ehh Rust has a couple features, but it’s totally not worth switching from my precious precious C”
like Rust
But no one is talking about that that is doesn’t need to be Rust. There are alternatives that can do as much if not more with the type system & safety while being as low-level as C without some of Rust’s restrictions.
Turns out there is a name for that. I had to look it up. Never seen such a striking example before.
I don’t think it does? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_reform_in_Esperanto
