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Rust for Professionals

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Re: Rust for Professionals

#11

Post by randmeerkat »

tmtvl wrote: post #5
joaquincabezas wrote: post #2

I keep saving these Rust resources for a near future... Am i the only one?? I really hope to start using Rust in 2023, probably for some kind of API gateway experimentation

I saved up Common Lisp resources for a few years and in 2022 I finally decided to sit down and learn it. It was entirely worth it, so I recommend you sit down to learn Rust one weekend. In fact, do it next weekend. Getting started on anything is always better done sooner than later.

> Getting started on anything is always better done sooner than later.

So true. It’s never too late, you’re never too old, there’s never something else you need to learn first, just do it.

Re: Rust for Professionals

#12

Post by kika »

tmtvl wrote: post #5
joaquincabezas wrote: post #2

I keep saving these Rust resources for a near future... Am i the only one?? I really hope to start using Rust in 2023, probably for some kind of API gateway experimentation

I saved up Common Lisp resources for a few years and in 2022 I finally decided to sit down and learn it. It was entirely worth it, so I recommend you sit down to learn Rust one weekend. In fact, do it next weekend. Getting started on anything is always better done sooner than later.

joaquincabezas, don't listen to this person. It's a trap. In February I found myself in AirBnB alone with nothing to do, because my wife had to stay back home for an extra week and I waited for her to join me. AirBnB had a decent work desk, decent(-ish) monitor and barely ok keyboard so I decided to learn Rust. Now it's January, I'm at 3000+ LoC of Rust and about 4000 in Dart/Flutter and trying to make the project to ShowHN. Weekend project, my ass. Rust is highly addictive, you've been warned. I tried to get sober, left this project for months on end, but always relapsed.

Re: Rust for Professionals

#13

Post by insanitybit »

attractivechaos wrote: post #8

Nice blog post. Nonetheless, to a new learner like me, the hardest part of rust is not its syntax; it is the ownership management. Sometimes I easily know how to implement a task efficiently in other languages but I have to fight the compiler in rust. I either need to reorganize data structures, which takes effort, or to make a compromise by cloning objects, which affects performance. Note that I do agree with rust d…

The short answer is... yeah, just clone the objects. Whatever other languages are doing is going to have the same tradeoff - performance (or safety, if the other languages aren't memory safe). Iff it becomes a problem, come back later and remove the '.clone()'.

Re: Rust for Professionals

#14

Post by aussiesnack »

attractivechaos wrote: post #8

Nice blog post. Nonetheless, to a new learner like me, the hardest part of rust is not its syntax; it is the ownership management. Sometimes I easily know how to implement a task efficiently in other languages but I have to fight the compiler in rust. I either need to reorganize data structures, which takes effort, or to make a compromise by cloning objects, which affects performance. Note that I do agree with rust d…

But it's so easy to get a handle on how the borrow checker works! Just check out this thread and all will become clear: https://users.rust-lang.org/t/what-is-a-good-mental-model-of...

Joke btw. That thread is a hilarious trainwreck - surely the final nail in the coffin for the Rust advocates who so often deny anything about Rust is difficult to learn.

I don't mean that as an anti-Rust jibe, in fact I'm planning to get back to it this year (having given up in despair last). I like much about it, and think it's tremendously practical for many purposes. But it just is a difficult language, no question.

Re: Rust for Professionals

#15

Post by zozbot234 »

insanitybit wrote: post #13
attractivechaos wrote: post #8

Nice blog post. Nonetheless, to a new learner like me, the hardest part of rust is not its syntax; it is the ownership management. Sometimes I easily know how to implement a task efficiently in other languages but I have to fight the compiler in rust. I either need to reorganize data structures, which takes effort, or to make a compromise by cloning objects, which affects performance. Note that I do agree with rust d…

The short answer is... yeah, just clone the objects. Whatever other languages are doing is going to have the same tradeoff - performance (or safety, if the other languages aren't memory safe). Iff it becomes a problem, come back later and remove the '.clone()'.

You can also use Cow to choose between cloning and and immutable borrowing at runtime.

Re: Rust for Professionals

#17

Post by insanitybit »

zozbot234 wrote: post #15
insanitybit wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The short answer is... yeah, just clone the objects. Whatever other languages are doing is going to have the same tradeoff - performance (or safety, if the other languages aren't memory safe). Iff it becomes a problem, come back later and remove the '.clone()'.

You can also use Cow to choose between cloning and and immutable borrowing at runtime.

Unless you're using `'static` you will still run into lifetimes with Cow, which I suspect a lot of people will find difficult. I'd suggest just using clone, learning the broader language, and learning about lifetime stuff later.

Lifetimes aren't hard or complicated, what's complicated is understand their interaction with other features (closures) when you don't even understand wtf closures in rust are, or traits, etc. I'd just focus on the other stuff for as long as you can.

Re: Rust for Professionals

#18

Post by tmtvl »

skor wrote: post #16

any constructive criticism on rust syntax?

Using clearly defined bit sizes (i32, f64) rather than legacy naming conventions (int, double) is a good idea, the language could be really quite something if they switch to S-expressions.

Re: Rust for Professionals

#19

Post by insanitybit »

aussiesnack wrote: post #14
attractivechaos wrote: post #8

Nice blog post. Nonetheless, to a new learner like me, the hardest part of rust is not its syntax; it is the ownership management. Sometimes I easily know how to implement a task efficiently in other languages but I have to fight the compiler in rust. I either need to reorganize data structures, which takes effort, or to make a compromise by cloning objects, which affects performance. Note that I do agree with rust d…

But it's so easy to get a handle on how the borrow checker works! Just check out this thread and all will become clear: https://users.rust-lang.org/t/what-is-a-good-mental-model-of... Joke btw. That thread is a hilarious trainwreck - surely the final nail in the coffin for the Rust advocates who so often deny anything about Rust is difficult to learn. I don't mean that as an anti-Rust jibe, in fact I'm planning to ge…

I mean, some question. I learned Rust with 0 professional experience in any language (I learned it after I dropped out of a CS program after 2.5 years) and I found it pretty damn easy. That was in 2015 when the language was wayyyy less approachable (worse borrow checker, everything used nightly, smaller community, no book).

Easy is relative. I suspect a major reason I found it easy was because I didn't try to solve lifetime problems, I just cloned things. I also had primarily been using C++ in school so I was pretty familiar with pointers and, to some extent, ownership. Plus my initial foray into CS was driven by a desire to do exploit development professionally, so lower level details weren't scary at all.

Re: Rust for Professionals

#20

Post by aussiesnack »

insanitybit wrote: post #19
aussiesnack wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it's so easy to get a handle on how the borrow checker works! Just check out this thread and all will become clear: https://users.rust-lang.org/t/what-is-a-good-mental-model-of... Joke btw. That thread is a hilarious trainwreck - surely the final nail in the coffin for the Rust advocates who so often deny anything about Rust is difficult to learn. I don't mean that as an anti-Rust jibe, in fact I'm planning to ge…

I mean, some question. I learned Rust with 0 professional experience in any language (I learned it after I dropped out of a CS program after 2.5 years) and I found it pretty damn easy. That was in 2015 when the language was wayyyy less approachable (worse borrow checker, everything used nightly, smaller community, no book). Easy is relative. I suspect a major reason I found it easy was because I didn't try to solve l…

> Easy is relative

In the case of programming languages, yes, it's relative to the difficulty of other PLs. I've learned many over the years, and found Rust by far the hardest (it's the only one that defeated me). And it's not the most different from others I've learned - lisps are far further from the common languages than Rust is.

> I suspect a major reason I found it easy was because I didn't try to solve lifetime problems,

Well yes anything's easy if you skip the hard bits. Learn C without using pointers.

I personally didn't find ownership & borrows the hardest part - in my case it's the great complexity of many of the commonly used libraries. Rust's complexity bleeds out into the entire ecosystem (a cultural thing).

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