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Why I love Rust

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Re: Why I love Rust

#21

Post by weavie »

clouddrover wrote: post #9
namelezz wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Career wise, you should pick up popular languages, Java/C#/Python/Ruby/JavaScript. Between Go and Rust, I think you should pick Go because there are a significant number of developers from Python/Ruby/JavaScript enjoying programming Go. Many startups start using Go[1] and couple of universities use Go in their classes[2]. Rust targets system development primarily occupied by C/C++ developers. Many still prefer C++ an…

The TIOBE Index for January, 2016 has Java at number one. Rust is at 47 and Go is outside the top 50: http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/

Visual Basic.NET more popular than Javascript? Assembly language more popular than Ruby? That doesn't seem right to me.

Re: Why I love Rust

#22

Post by Animats »

mcpherrinm wrote: post #3
middleclick wrote: post #2

I want to spend at least 3-4 months learning a new language but just can't figure out if I should spent time learning Rust or Go. I am thinking more of it from a career perspective than interest.

While I'm bullish on Rust being a big language in the next few years, there's not much production use yet -- it's still pretty immature from a production tooling point of view. Go, on the other hand, has a lot of adoption. So if you're looking for a language to use on the job today, it's gonna be Go.

Go is really easy to learn if you're coming from a scripting language. It's used for a lot of server-side processing. It's probably more immediately useful than Rust if you want to get work.

Rust is elegant and the future of serious programming, but not mainstream yet.

Re: Why I love Rust

#23

Post by pcwalton »

hellofunk wrote: post #19
pcwalton wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a weird answer to the question, especially since Rust very probably has whatever "modern C++ techniques" you were thinking of.

I disagree. As others have pointed out, the demand for C++ jobs is still much higher than Rust jobs, so I think my answer still stands as a way to set yourself apart when thinking of a new language to spend a few months on. Ideally, one would learn Rust and C++ both and see how they differ, and why.

> I disagree. As others have pointed out, the demand for C++ jobs is still much higher than Rust jobs, so I think my answer still stands as a way to set yourself apart when thinking of a new language to spend a few months on.

It's not going to be a particularly interesting thread if everyone who works in a language that trends higher than Go on Google chimes in to say "you should learn my language instead, because it's more popular".

> Ideally, one would learn Rust and C++ both and see how they differ, and why.

Aside from uninteresting language-specific details, C++ essentially doesn't teach you anything that Rust doesn't.

Re: Why I love Rust

#24

Post by Animats »

pcwalton wrote: post #17
hellofunk wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually think you'd go far to spend 3 - 4 months learning C++. Almost every language you can likely encounter in your career will use some feature that will get introduced to you in C++, especially modern C++, and, almost any language will be easier to learn and use after first going through a C++ learning curve. Besides, C++ is still the big player, more than all others. Even Apple's new language Swift is written…

This is a weird answer to the question, especially since Rust very probably has whatever "modern C++ techniques" you were thinking of.

Learning C++ means you have to learn a lot about how to debug C++, and understand exactly what's going on at the machine, OS, and debugger level. Whether this is a productive use of your life is up to you.

Re: Why I love Rust

#25

Post by bsaul »

She got a job offer from apple kernel team just because she tried and failed to write an OS for a few weeks ??

I don't want to sound misogynistic, but could this be related in any way to some apple policy of trying to recruite female engineers ? Or is it so hard to find people willing to work on this part of the stack ?

Re: Why I love Rust

#26

Post by hellofunk »

pcwalton wrote: post #23
hellofunk wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. As others have pointed out, the demand for C++ jobs is still much higher than Rust jobs, so I think my answer still stands as a way to set yourself apart when thinking of a new language to spend a few months on. Ideally, one would learn Rust and C++ both and see how they differ, and why.

> I disagree. As others have pointed out, the demand for C++ jobs is still much higher than Rust jobs, so I think my answer still stands as a way to set yourself apart when thinking of a new language to spend a few months on. It's not going to be a particularly interesting thread if everyone who works in a language that trends higher than Go on Google chimes in to say "you should learn my language instead, because it…

>It's not going to be a particularly interesting thread if everyone who works in a language that trends higher than Go on Google chimes in to say "you should learn my language instead, because it's more popular".

I think C++ is unique in that it is really not as popular as many new languages, not as trendy and as much in the news, and not even taught as much in college programs, yet, it remains the language where so many jobs are. This gives anyone with the desire to learn it a good and marketable skill that can make it possibly easier to find work and continue making a living doing software development. That does not apply to Rust, so I think it's a fair point to make to anyone who is asking about what languages are good to learn.

As for whether C++ has any techniques to teach that Rust does not, C++ is definitely a unique experience to go through and certainly gives a developer more insight into the actual machine they are working on in a way that few languages do.

Re: Why I love Rust

#28

Post by pcwalton »

hellofunk wrote: post #26
pcwalton wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I disagree. As others have pointed out, the demand for C++ jobs is still much higher than Rust jobs, so I think my answer still stands as a way to set yourself apart when thinking of a new language to spend a few months on. It's not going to be a particularly interesting thread if everyone who works in a language that trends higher than Go on Google chimes in to say "you should learn my language instead, because it…

>It's not going to be a particularly interesting thread if everyone who works in a language that trends higher than Go on Google chimes in to say "you should learn my language instead, because it's more popular". I think C++ is unique in that it is really not as popular as many new languages, not as trendy and as much in the news, and not even taught as much in college programs, yet, it remains the language where so…

> it remains the language where so many jobs are

"The" language where so many jobs are? It's one of many.

> As for whether C++ has any techniques to teach that Rust does not, C++ is definitely a unique experience to go through and certainly gives a developer more insight into the actual machine they are working on in a way that few languages do.

Can you name, specifically, a way in which C++ gives you "more insight into the actual machine" compared to Rust?

Re: Why I love Rust

#29

Post by loudmax »

middleclick wrote: post #2

I want to spend at least 3-4 months learning a new language but just can't figure out if I should spent time learning Rust or Go. I am thinking more of it from a career perspective than interest.

Go is a lot easier to learn than Rust, and there are jobs programming Go available now. This means that you could be working professionally with Go quite soon.

Rust is more challenging, and there aren't many jobs available yet. But there is a possibility for Rust to displace C/C++ for certain classes of applications, and that is a very big deal. Also, skill in a more difficult language is a scarce commodity. If Rust does take off and you're one of the relatively few people who understand it well, this would make make you quite valuable.

Re: Why I love Rust

#30

Post by dagw »

middleclick wrote: post #2

I want to spend at least 3-4 months learning a new language but just can't figure out if I should spent time learning Rust or Go. I am thinking more of it from a career perspective than interest.

What kind of projects to you want to work on (from a career perspective)? Rust seems to trend towards more systems programming tasks while Go seems to trend towards network server projects.
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