It’s a programming language, which is particularly relevant for Linux, because it doesn’t require a runtime (separate program that runs the code). This allows it to be used in the kernel.
But it also means that it’s very good for building libraries. With a small bit of extra work, virtually any other programming language can call libraries implemented in Rust (like you can with libraries implemented in C).
Add to that, that Rust allows for performance similar to C and makes lots of typical C bugs impossible, and suddenly you’ve got folks rewriting all kinds of C libraries and applications in Rust, which is something you might have also heard about.Ah yes, the C bugs in the kernel libraries. We’ve all seen them.
Ah yes, intentionally misunderstanding someone’s comment. We’ve all seen them.
I mean, what the heck is this passive-aggressive comment? If you disagree with me, then come at me.
Plenty of patched memory leaks in the last few years. You can pretend they dont exist.
Thank you for the informative response. I knew rust was a programming language, but didn’t know it’s significance.
Iron Oxide. Everyone else is wrong.
No. OP meant to type crust which is an inedible handle for pizza. I will die on this hill.
Get extra sauce. The whole point of bread is to carry sauce.
This guy fucks. Although, if I’m gonna put sauce on it, what’s a little more cheese?
you meant to say incredible instead of inedible, since it’s the best part of the pizza, with the best taste
ITS JUST BREAD
exactly, bread is vrry eddble by itsssself
Idk about that fryman
pepple hav been doing it for thousands of yyeeers
why eat pizza if you like plain bread more?
pizza is mrre crrrsty
The amount of inedible is dependent on the amount of hungry
i’ll always eat that part unless i’m extremely full
I can agree with that, and the quality of the handle of course.
Ferrous oxide innit?
Wustite, ferrous oxide, is black. FeO.
Typical rust, usually found as hematite, is Fe2O3 and is red/brown. Also an iron oxide.
Magnetite is also another black iron oxide, Fe3O4.
There are quite a few other flavors of iron and oxygen too.
Ooh, cool! TIL
flavors of iron
Yum yum
Just like grandma supernova used to make
A type of person whos apartment would be a mess cause they never collect their garbage, but they have a good memory where they put things and what they need, so it is never a problem.
We used to have good, strong open source tools made out of C (which is a lot like steel - it can only be worked by blue collar computer nerds with muscly brains). Now that steel core is corroding because of the influence of hackers and other white collar computer sorts with their creative problem solving, and unintended uses of memory.
That new corrosion is called rust, and it eventually appears on every C project that’s left outside, unless someone comes along to brush it off occasionally.
It’s a brutally competitive and toxic game.
You must be looking for /c/playrust
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Water? Like, in the toilet??
The red part of old metals, lick it!
It’s a 2025 movie, starring Alec Baldwin, that gained notoriety in 2021, when a cinematographer was accidentally killed by a live round fired from a prop-revolver that Alex Baldwin was using.
How is it a prop if it can fire a real bullet?
Because a real gun is a prop gun if it’s being used as a prop.
It’s not the gun that was the issue, it was the fact that there was live ammunition on the set at all.
It’s a type of fungus.
It’s a survival crafting game where players help each other survive the world with mutual cooperation, kind words and absolutely no Nazi or racist behaviour.
Actually it’s a low budget western movie starring Alec Baldwin that resulted in the tragic killing of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins due to inadequate safety practices on set.
And no bee grenades
ABSOLUTELY no racism, whatsoever
a low level language that has really nice features when compared to c and c++, but honestly i find it difficult to read. probably my lack of experience with it, tho.
Golang is better for many things
Golang is almost never the best choice
Rust has readability issues
Golang isn’t perfect but it does improve readability thus maintainably.
I’m not saying Rust is better for all applications, but IMO Golang has a pretty bad readability due to the “simplicity” they keep adhering to. Heck, even their generics support is still pretty terrible, and that’s a fundamental feature for properly readable code.
If you’re dealing with backend stuff
It’s a cult.
Have you heard of our lord and savior memory management?
No, not those other false gods
cargocult
Rust is both a nice programming language, and an obnoxious social movement made of a small minority of Rust programmers who are very loud
oh I don’t consider them obnoxious. I’m from Python-land, they’ve been saving our asses with good tooling lol. the quality of output from the rust ecosystem speaks for itself
uv <3
who are very loud
Most of the “should we or should we not” discourses/dramas I’ve read about were initiated or escalated by the anti-Rust crowd. They seem to be a lot more vocal (not to mention impolite) about their opinions than actual Rust developers.
Specifically in the Linux kernel, the 2 big reasons to use it are memory safety (huuuuggee benefit) and that a lot of younger devs like it and thus it will attract their contributions.
The only reasons I can think of to not use it are that some people want their own toolchain and having multiple languages in the kernel adds complication. But tbh, none of that justifies banning Rust stuff that realistically wouldn’t have been written at all if C were the only option.
And then there’s the people who show up in Phoronix, HN, Reddit, and YouTube comments saying Rust is over-hyped without showing why it’s unfit for purpose and also trying to dictate what someone does with their own project. Perhaps it’s something to do with the representation of queer people and other minorities in the Rust community, because otherwise I do not understand why people would be sooo passionate in hating the Rust community like the group I described above is.
having multiple languages in the kernel adds complication.
which is why we should simply rewrite the whole kernel in rust. boom problem fixed 😎 /j
a lot of younger devs like it and thus it will attract their contributions.
You get it! That is probably the biggest “soft” factor for why I want to see Rust proliferate. Nobody wants to learn C! It’s an ancient, cumbersome language that is difficult to use in a secure way. I’ve been both a student and an employee at a university with many programming-related classes, and beyond the absolute basics of memory management, nobody does anything in C, or even C++. It’s almost always C#, Java, Javascript, or Python. No Rust yet because most of our teachers are also geriatrics.
Linux (and FOSS in general) has an age issue. Prolific older developers are leaving their projects or transitioning to less code-focused tasks, and the ranks are not being filled. Prospective young developers simply bounce off projects because of steep entry requirements, and the active resistance of anti-Rust evangelists (the likes of Christoph Hellwig for example) doesn’t help either.
That’s rather rude and untrue … the programming language isn’t at all nice! /s
ducks and runs away
small minority of Rust programmers who are very loud
They also list “written in Rust” as the primary feature of software they write, even though the majority of users don’t care as long as it works properly.
It matters to potential contributors. It’s also a floating signifier for a lot of things.
The majority of users aren’t contributors though. It’s fine to mention it in contributor documentation but I find it weird to advertise it as an end-user feature given most apps written in other languages don’t do this.
It’s also a floating signifier for a lot of things.
Like what?
A program being written in rust itself doesn’t guarantee anything, but it tells you what you’ll probably find:
- Utf-8 support
- No shenanigans with installations, dynamic libraries and such. Just download and execute.
- Multi-platform support
- Low resource usage.
- semver.
- Compile with just 1 command if you want to.
- MIT/apache2 license.
- No memory leaks.
- If it crashes, at least it will probably log out something more helpful than “SEGFAULT”.
Many of those are highly positive to the end consumer.
Most of those points are true for programs written in Go too, and C# (if you use Native AoT).
