Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Rust has been forked to the Crab Language

github.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

451–460 of 555 posts

Re: Rust has been forked to the Crab Language

#451

Post by ngngngng »

insanitybit wrote: post #445
yjftsjthsd-h wrote: post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This fork promises "All of the memory-safe features you love, now with 100% less bureaucracy!" Compelling, until you realise that all the commits are auto-merges of rust-lang/rust's main branch. Which means the same teams doing the same work, under a different name. It started out specifically as a reaction to Rust's take on trademarks, so shipping the exact same code with a different name was the point .

OK but it says "100% less bureaucracy", although it doesn't actually seem to have a plan for that. Changing the name is... fine? Like it's definitely a thing you can do, for sure. I'm not sure what that accomplishes - you can use this project and there's no trademark policy so... I guess you could abuse that if you wanted to? Like you could start your own "CrabCon" and no one could say anything about it legally... ok…

The "less bureaucracy" is the lack of the same trademark policy. That's literally it. They're not threatening to sue you if you don't include disclaimers on everything you do while using their language.

Re: Rust has been forked to the Crab Language

#452

Post by newobj »

throwaway1777 wrote: post #411
tpoacher wrote: post #387

One thing I always find interesting / amusing is how the timing of certain types of post here on HN is in a sense far more informative (e.g. by implication as to "what is the current zeitgeist that has suddenly made this "news" or relevant again?), than the linked articles themselves. E.g. crablang wasn't exactly announced yesterday for this to be newsworthy in itself; but an HN top post on crablang almost serves as…

This is the power of the media and why people fight over it so much. Whenever you see content you should not only question the content itself but also ask “why am I seeing this now”?

Why am I seeing this now?

Re: Rust has been forked to the Crab Language

#453

Post by insanitybit »

ngngngng wrote: post #451
insanitybit wrote: post #445

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK but it says "100% less bureaucracy", although it doesn't actually seem to have a plan for that. Changing the name is... fine? Like it's definitely a thing you can do, for sure. I'm not sure what that accomplishes - you can use this project and there's no trademark policy so... I guess you could abuse that if you wanted to? Like you could start your own "CrabCon" and no one could say anything about it legally... ok…

The "less bureaucracy" is the lack of the same trademark policy. That's literally it. They're not threatening to sue you if you don't include disclaimers on everything you do while using their language.

> The "less bureaucracy" is the lack of the same trademark policy. That's literally it.

Right, and like I said, that's fine. But it's pretty meaningless and actually has literally nothing to do with the language, which has no trademarks associated with it (nor could it ever have such a trademark as the foundation does not "own" the language). So forking a language over a trademark that doesn't apply to a language makes very little sense.

> They're not threatening to sue you if you don't include disclaimers on everything you do while using their language.

No one is threatening to sue anyone for using the rust programming language. That is an extremely incorrect view.

At best you could say there is a threat to sue someone for how they use certain terms or icons, but this is completely unrelated to the language itself. It's also completely standard. Further, the document in question was a draft submitted for feedback.

Almost any language is going to want trademark. Python recently had to deal with a troll trying to assert ownership over the branding because they had not defended against this. As someone mentions in an issue on the crab repo,

    How would you feel about a shady company posturing as "The Official Rust" distributing a paid copy of the compiler? Does that seems like a thing we as a community should allow? That's what the trademark policy is for: preventing shady abuses of our beloved lang and community.
These things will absolutely happen - they have happened before to other languages!

I think software developers just have no idea how these things work. You know that every LICENSE.txt is a "threat to sue you" by your standard?

edit: Also, you're wrong. Their goals go beyond just removal of the trademark policy.

Re: Rust has been forked to the Crab Language

#454

Post by mikeryan »

slashdev wrote: post #396
MuffinFlavored wrote: post #359

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sure, Crab will almost certainly not replace Rust, but that is not the goal. I see it as: there's a finite amount of people who choose to dedicate their unpaid free time contributing to making Rust better (working on fixing bugs, new features, etc.) This seems like fragmentation which basically will slow down progress. Now, obviously the people who choose to dedicate their free time to open source software are enti…

On the other hand it could become a place to test ideas and port the winners over to rust. It’s not necessarily negative.

io.js (node.js fork) seems like a parallel. It split off to get away from Joyents advisory board that was slowing down development and the trademark issues around Node. It was more performant in the short term with faster development cycles. Once the issues with Joyent were worked out it was merged back into mainline node.

Different political issues here so whether it gets ported back into Rust or becomes what Rust was (or just fades away) is still TBD but who knows?

Re: Rust has been forked to the Crab Language

#455

Post by reactordev »

timkofu wrote: post #444
weinzierl wrote: post #55

I disagree with the general sentiment in this thread that this is a useless immature move. Sure, Crab will almost certainly not replace Rust, but that is not the goal. The ultimate objective is to influence Rust stakeholders' decisions. This is similar to a strike where ultimately your goal is not to destroy the company or to quit and leave, but to achieve better conditions. In both cases it sometimes works and somet…

It’s evidence of division and strife. They have allowed the environment to get toxic. Groups that were planning on adopting Rust will now think twice, as it’s future now looks uncertain. All organizations that produce something valuable face this test, it’s the ones that don’t fracture that succeed.

This. When tech leaders look at Rust as a solution for legacy products and services - then see Crab grab - it makes them think the ecosystem isn't mature enough for their 25+yr old platform.

Re: Rust has been forked to the Crab Language

#458

Post by bee_rider »

arp242 wrote: post #202
toyg wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A wiser and less ego-centric Stallman would have stepped back decades ago. I don't agree. For all his limits, Stallman maintained an ideological purity that is required to firmly signpost one end of the Overton window. Opensource licenses and projects can mix and match rights and regulations, but you will always have an unwatered GPL option, there to remind people of what the original ideal looked like. Compare the…

It's about effective advocacy. Stallman can think or do whatever he wants, but he is not and has never been an effective advocate. And from an advocacy position, ideological purity almost never works. An advocacy organisation like the FSF should be pragmatically "climbing the ladder" one step at a time, not insisting on an instantaneous revolution. You might as well advocate for the moon to be painted blue: it's just…

Firefox is competing with a product of the world’s largest advertising company, I’d tend to assume that, rather than technical merit, is where it fell behind.

Re: Rust has been forked to the Crab Language

#459

Post by yjftsjthsd-h »

agilob wrote: post #36
coffeeblack wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Forking is an essential feature in OSS, its what OSS is all about.

Yes, because it worked out well for Java.

When did Java get forked? The closest case I can think of is the Oracle/Google lawsuit, which 1. Oracle lost, and 2. wouldn't have even been a thing if Google had forked rather than reimplementing.

Re: Rust has been forked to the Crab Language

#460

Post by rozab »

weinzierl wrote: post #55

I disagree with the general sentiment in this thread that this is a useless immature move. Sure, Crab will almost certainly not replace Rust, but that is not the goal. The ultimate objective is to influence Rust stakeholders' decisions. This is similar to a strike where ultimately your goal is not to destroy the company or to quit and leave, but to achieve better conditions. In both cases it sometimes works and somet…

That's an interesting viewpoint, it parallels the outsized influence small parties exert in FPTP electoral systems (at least in functioning ones)
Post reply on HN