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Re: Integrating "safe" languages into OpenBSD? (2017)

marc.info

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Re: Re: Integrating "safe" languages into OpenBSD? (2017)

#11
post #8

> I wasn't implying. I was stating a fact. There has been no attempt to move the smallest parts of the ecosystem, to provide replacements for base POSIX utilities. This is in fact incorrect--there is a project aiming to build all of the coreutils in Rust ( https://github.com/uutils/coreutils ). More to the point: while I do concur in the conclusion that Rust shouldn't be a part of the OpenBSD base system, the gatekee…

[deleted]

Re: Re: Integrating "safe" languages into OpenBSD? (2017)

#12
post #4

Rust is good at preventing memory leaks. It doesn't matter (as much) for a command line utility that runs for one second then exits. Of course, there are now utilities written in Rust. https://github.com/samuela/rustybox

The crux of his argument isn’t really that these tools can’t be written. The self-bootstrapping requirement of OpenBSD means that incorporating one Rust-based core utility would require Rust and LLVM to be built when building OpenBSD, which is an incredibly large cost. It’s simply too early to seriously entertain such a notion.

Once there are a large number of core utilities implemented in Rust that show some significant practical benefit over the C versions, the situation may be different.

Re: Re: Integrating "safe" languages into OpenBSD? (2017)

#14
post #8

> I wasn't implying. I was stating a fact. There has been no attempt to move the smallest parts of the ecosystem, to provide replacements for base POSIX utilities. This is in fact incorrect--there is a project aiming to build all of the coreutils in Rust ( https://github.com/uutils/coreutils ). More to the point: while I do concur in the conclusion that Rust shouldn't be a part of the OpenBSD base system, the gatekee…

Linked mailing list message is from 2017, which is may be after when the linked project was started/viable.

Re: Re: Integrating "safe" languages into OpenBSD? (2017)

#16
post #5

All the core utils have been ported to rust for the redox project, and there are actually superior alternatives in some cases available like ripgrep.

rg is great but it isn't a drop-in replacement for POSIX grep, which means even if you have rg you still need to ship another grep so all your existing scripts and programs that expect to be able to invoke POSIX grep don't break.

Re: Re: Integrating "safe" languages into OpenBSD? (2017)

#17
post #8

> I wasn't implying. I was stating a fact. There has been no attempt to move the smallest parts of the ecosystem, to provide replacements for base POSIX utilities. This is in fact incorrect--there is a project aiming to build all of the coreutils in Rust ( https://github.com/uutils/coreutils ). More to the point: while I do concur in the conclusion that Rust shouldn't be a part of the OpenBSD base system, the gatekee…

You make valid point, but you can't fault Theo for predicting a different future in 2017.

Re: Re: Integrating "safe" languages into OpenBSD? (2017)

#18
post #4

Rust is good at preventing memory leaks. It doesn't matter (as much) for a command line utility that runs for one second then exits. Of course, there are now utilities written in Rust. https://github.com/samuela/rustybox

While it's clear that writing tools from the start in Rust can prevent memory leaks, this project isn't a great example. It won't be safe until the community refactors it out and fixes all the c2rust unsafe calls.

Re: Re: Integrating "safe" languages into OpenBSD? (2017)

#19
> However there is a rampant fiction that if you supply a new safer method everyone will use it. For gods sake, the simplest of concepts like the stack protector took nearly 10 years for adoption, let people should switch languages? DELUSION.

Yeah, I agree: if the sole value proposition were 'security' it would be a really slow roll. cargo is the killer app IMO. Anyone who's walked a big dependency tree - download, build, oh oops this requires libfoo - download, build, oh oops that requires libbar...

But I think lots of coders land on rust because they want or need something faster or more portable than Python or JS and rust is 'easier' than C.

Re: Re: Integrating "safe" languages into OpenBSD? (2017)

#20
post #14
post #8

> I wasn't implying. I was stating a fact. There has been no attempt to move the smallest parts of the ecosystem, to provide replacements for base POSIX utilities. This is in fact incorrect--there is a project aiming to build all of the coreutils in Rust ( https://github.com/uutils/coreutils ). More to the point: while I do concur in the conclusion that Rust shouldn't be a part of the OpenBSD base system, the gatekee…

Linked mailing list message is from 2017, which is may be after when the linked project was started/viable.

No need to speculate, if you follow the GitHub link you'll see that the project is older than 2017.
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