My thoughts on the Bun Rust rewrite • Hacker News Board

Re: My thoughts on the Bun Rust rewrite

#711

Post by mtlynch » Fri, Jul 10, 2026, 10:49 PM UTC

FreakLegion wrote: post #694

mtlynch wrote: post #673

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Andrew was wrong. He stealth edited his post to hide it. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48854921

I'm aware he edited it, but the original version isn't wrong, either. Just like Jarred's > We fuzz Bun's runtime APIs 24/7 using Fuzzilli, the JavaScript engine fuzzer used by V8 & JavaScriptCore isn't wrong, even though that was only being done for the last 5-6 months of Zig Bun, and not the previous 5 years when they were accruing all of their tech debt.

I'm having trouble understanding what you mean.

If I say, "I run 5 miles every day" and my old neighbor says, "I lived next door to him until 9 months ago, and he definitely doesn't run 5 miles a day," and then I show my GPS logs proving I've been running 5 miles a day for the last 9 months, I am correct and my ex-neighbor is incorrect.

If Sumner had said, "We've been fuzzing our code for years," then Kelley could justifiably say that's incorrect. But Sumner is saying that currently Bun fuzzes their code, which is true, so Kelley appears to be incorrect to claim it is a "fabrication."

Re: My thoughts on the Bun Rust rewrite

#712

Post by rrvsh » Sat, Jul 11, 2026, 12:33 AM UTC

roetlich wrote: post #649

rrvsh wrote: post #600

Earlier quoted context omitted.

prepending argumentum is literally just expanding the informal name for the fallacy to the full name of "an argument to the person", easily verifiable with one search query. unless you are saying that you were 1. originally just making your own contraction from argumentum ad hominem, 2. normally use latin in online forum comments, 3. often use ad hominem in your own speech to mean a different thing from the common pa…

Love the exclamation marks. So let's just use, for example, this definition: https://www.britannica.com/topic/ad-hominem Here it's a type of argument, and it's only sometimes a fallacy. Seems like this how it's defined most of the time, unless you explicitly look for "ad hominem fallacy". Ad hominem without any context can be vague, I guess, so I tried to be more explicit. I don't know, maybe I'm wrong, English isn't…

It's a reference to TFA :)

from your very link:

> ad hominem, type of argument or attack that appeals to prejudice or feelings or irrelevantly impugns another person’s character instead of addressing the facts or claims made by the latter.

> Ad hominem arguments are often taught to be a type of fallacy, an erroneous form of argumentation, although this is not necessarily the case. A number of scholars have noted that questioning a person’s character is a fallacy only insofar as the person’s character is not logically relevant to the debate.

You are right! The link does discuss cases where it's not a fallacy - in those cases, it is instead a valid argument. Again, not what you said.

Re: My thoughts on the Bun Rust rewrite

#713

Post by tomnipotent » Sat, Jul 11, 2026, 12:38 AM UTC

jazzypants wrote: post #295

ModernMech wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right I think the correct term is “character assassination”. It starts by calling him a novice, goes on to call him a “stinky manager”, and then lands the deepest cut possible in this profession: his code sucks. At least Kelley thanked him for his money. This is not refreshing, I usually expect better from Kelley. The best move would have been to say nothing at all except “best of luck, Zig will miss him but”. Now al…

Do you think that all ziglings refuse to write idiomatic code, have public fights with the language maintainers, and then write giant blog posts about how they're ditching the language because it just isn't good enough?

> have public fights with the language maintainers

Can you point to even one such example?

Re: My thoughts on the Bun Rust rewrite

#714

Post by CrimsonRain » Sat, Jul 11, 2026, 1:31 AM UTC

speedster217 wrote: post #242

CrimsonRain wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's ubiquitous among dinosaurs. Don't worry. They will be left behind.

[flagged]

Real engineers do real engineering with all tools at their disposal. Don't cry about one specific tool because it hurts their childish feelings...but you keep crying. It is ok to be a dino.

Re: My thoughts on the Bun Rust rewrite

#715

Post by Fifnmar » Sat, Jul 11, 2026, 2:09 AM UTC

Aurornis wrote: post #415

grayhatter wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Or maybe he doesn't care, and just wants to attack Jarred? I've worked with ark enough that I think I've started to learn his default style, or at the very least to know that from him; this isn't an attack. If that was your read, I think you're taking more from sources that aren't this post. I wonder if you're confusing statements of fact, for attacks? They're distinct, and the context for the post. I'm sure he's b…

> I've worked with ark enough that I think I've started to learn his default style, or at the very least to know that from him; this isn't an attack. If that was your read, I think you're taking more from sources that aren't this post. You start by taking more from sources that aren’t this post, then in the very next sentence accuse the other person of doing what you just admitted to. This article has very clear atta…

Lmao when I can learn to master speaking like you;;

That said I have positive feelings about Zig as a project, but I do see it is a straight vitality show of a person rather than someone putting broader adoption in front. If Andrew K ever prioritized adoption he would have been a kind and dull leader keen on advertising here and there but he is not, he puts principles first, and people abide with him to see what he could bring to the world, not for being kind, so if people say they know Andrew K they are actually saying well he has that in his personality

Re: My thoughts on the Bun Rust rewrite

#716

Post by grayhatter » Sat, Jul 11, 2026, 5:53 AM UTC

Aurornis wrote: post #408

gorjusborg wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I almost completely disagree. Unprofessional? Maybe a little, but honest, and while the truth isn't flattering to Jarred, I'd say generally kind. Embarrassing? Not from my seat. Andrew is just revealing the relationship dynamics between a principled programming language developers and pragmatic business users of that language. I had already inferred a bunch that this post confirms based on the agentic port from forke…

> I'd say generally kind. How is saying someone wrote “slop” and is stinky kind? I can’t understand these comments that claim the article was generally kind, unless you and I read different articles with different words. I legitimately had to go back and check that the article hadn’t been edited to remove some of the ad hominems

The answer is likely some form of different expectations. You expected the behavior not to be the topic. Where as I assume, other people are upset by the behavior of bun et al, and because this reply was somewhat measured, it seemed more polite then they expected.

I think you're assumption that it's 'filled with ad hominem attacks' is good evidence for that. I'd have to go back, and go line by line to be sure, but there are no ad hominem attacks. Ad hominem has a specific meaning: arguing against the person, instead of the argument. If the argument is about the behavior of a person, then unless one of those people is a party to the argument, it's exceptionally unlikely to be an ad hominem attack.

Argument: you can't trust the quality of the code $person produces. They mostly release slop code.

Neither are ad hominem: because words mean things. They're attacks against the code quality, and reputation of the subject. But they're not ad hominem. You may not like the opinion. But that doesn't make it an inappropriate attack against the person, the behavior and decisions they've made and the impact those decisions have had, are the topic of the post.

I guess technically, he takes shots at claude which no doubt wrote large sections of this? But I also would object to calling that ad hominem, and doubt that's what you meant?

Finally, even if I did agree the argument that the language in the blog post targets the speaker, more than it addresses the topic wasn't stupid, (I don't agree, it is a stupid idea). The social responsibility/contract to: never do anything publicly that might be considered an attack; was released when bun decided to comment publicly with disputed facts.

Oh no, someone wrote a blog post as a response and refutation to an otherwise unprovoked public post spreading what the author considers misinformation about something they care about?! Maybe they shouldn't have said anything?

How much politeness do you feel is owed? Why are the critiques enumerated improper? I'm honestly curious if you have reasons that I just can't see? Or if it's just vibes based? You don't like how it feels, and that's your objection? Ideally something like: this specific quote is completely off-topic, and exists not to express an idea important to the author, but near exclusively to insult a person. So that I can understand why you see insults that I can't see. If it's true, I can't consider it an insult.

Last question: would all your objections go mostly/completely away if every paragraph was prefixed by "In my opinion"?

Re: My thoughts on the Bun Rust rewrite

#717

Post by sevenseacat » Sat, Jul 11, 2026, 7:31 AM UTC

aayushdutt wrote: post #385

The blog post looks a bit distasteful if I'm honest. I was expecting a technical writeup explaining why it was/wasn't a good fit for zig. > He gets to live out his productivity fantasy fever dream, he's probably already super wealthy. He has minor tech celebrity status. Looks like a backhanded personal comment? This didn't need to be in the article. > It's almost like the marketing department of a trillion dollar com…

> I don't understand how even today software engineers are calling LLM written code slop? It's objectively much better than what most of the engineers write, and it's not stopping to get better. If you still believe this, try out any frontier model on any work that you are currently doing, that should change your mind. There still are like 1% of cases where LLMs are not that good, but even there almost all of the time the issue is in the engineer's steering, not the LLM

I don't understand how anyone can say this with a straight face. And how you automatically assume that anyone who has this opinion, is just doing it wrong by not using the latest models.

"The significant percentage of people who are pointing out problems and issues with LLM-generated code are all just holding the tool wrong!"

While of course skill and experience plays a part, if so many people are trying to get good output from a tool and failing - the problem isn't with all of the people, the problem is with the tool.

Re: My thoughts on the Bun Rust rewrite

#718

Post by embedding-shape » Sat, Jul 11, 2026, 9:22 AM UTC

iknowstuff wrote: post #690

embedding-shape wrote: post #633

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the article kind of gives you the energy you enter the reading with. My take away was closer to "This is what we tried, this is the sentiment they gave back, then this is what happened, here's what I think of Jarred's way of working, glad they now use Rust, good riddance", but then I also apply this slightly unholy strategy of applying charitable reading when reading personal blog posts, and I worship neither…

You’re not concealing your jabs at me very well. This comment reads just like the post lmao, no wonder you enjoyed it

I'm not trying to conceal anything, nor did I say anywhere that I enjoyed the blog post either. With those reading abilities, no wonder the two of us got very different takeaways from the post itself.

Re: My thoughts on the Bun Rust rewrite

#719

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Jul 11, 2026, 1:19 PM UTC

embedding-shape wrote: post #718

iknowstuff wrote: post #690

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re not concealing your jabs at me very well. This comment reads just like the post lmao, no wonder you enjoyed it

I'm not trying to conceal anything, nor did I say anywhere that I enjoyed the blog post either. With those reading abilities, no wonder the two of us got very different takeaways from the post itself.

[deleted]

Re: My thoughts on the Bun Rust rewrite

#720

Post by dom96 » Sat, Jul 11, 2026, 2:11 PM UTC

grayhatter wrote: post #672

dom96 wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Calling someone’s code “slop” surely isn’t professional nor courteous.

it is. If I call your code slop, I'm being professional and courteous. The truth doesn't have a ethical value. Me calling your code slop might feel disrespectful, but it's less disrespectful than trying to pass slop off for your coworkers (or users) to use and deal with. Lying to someone, and allowing someone who's supposedly your friend to ship slop is more disrespectful. If I wrote shitty code, and my friend didn't…

Calling something "slop" is dismissive, vague and not constructive. That's why it's not professional.

If you want to tell someone their code quality is poor, then you better do so with specific things that is poor so that the person you are telling it to can learn and do better.