Implications of Rewriting a Browser Component in Rust
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Implications of Rewriting a Browser Component in Rust
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Re: Implications of Rewriting a Browser Component in Rust
#2I primarily use Java for my job. Security and memory related features of Rust are not an advantage compared to Java. But I like rust because it feels modern and produces efficient standalone binaries. Most of my hobby projects are in Rust now. But I would not rewrite any of my work projects in Rust even though they require ultimate performance. That would be a maintenance burden.
It is great to see people rewriting in Rust where it makes sense.
Re: Implications of Rewriting a Browser Component in Rust
#3I primarily use Java for my job. Security and memory related features of Rust are not an advantage compared to Java. But I like rust because it feels modern and produces efficient standalone binaries. Most of my hobby projects are in Rust now. But I would not rewrite any of my work projects in Rust even though they require ultimate performance. That would be a maintenance burden. It is great to see people rewriting i…
Nullpointer exceptions are a huge thing in Java.
Re: Implications of Rewriting a Browser Component in Rust
#4It's nice to see a balanced, real world, case study including 'these things are fixed by Rust', 'these are problems that don't occur in idiomatic Rust', and 'these are problems that Rust can't help you with'.
I'm a big fan of Rust, but the one sided 'Rust makes all the problems go away' articles don't provide any value.
Re: Implications of Rewriting a Browser Component in Rust
#5I primarily use Java for my job. Security and memory related features of Rust are not an advantage compared to Java. But I like rust because it feels modern and produces efficient standalone binaries. Most of my hobby projects are in Rust now. But I would not rewrite any of my work projects in Rust even though they require ultimate performance. That would be a maintenance burden. It is great to see people rewriting i…
Nullpointer exceptions are a huge thing in Java.
I haven't written any Rust in a few years, but last I knew, it was very possible for a Rust program to crash. The guarantee is that it won't corrupt memory while doing so.
Re: Implications of Rewriting a Browser Component in Rust
#6> could have been caught by a run time bounds check
And here I thought rust was all about zero cost abstractions.
Re: Implications of Rewriting a Browser Component in Rust
#7It's nice to see a balanced, real world, case study including 'these things are fixed by Rust', 'these are problems that don't occur in idiomatic Rust', and 'these are problems that Rust can't help you with'. I'm a big fan of Rust, but the one sided 'Rust makes all the problems go away' articles don't provide any value.
It also highlights an example of a security bug introduced during rewriting; highlighting that rewriting any significantly large piece of software is bound to introduce bugs.
Re: Implications of Rewriting a Browser Component in Rust
#8> could have been caught by a run time bounds check And here I thought rust was all about zero cost abstractions.
It's not, that's C++.
Rust requires a lot of runtime checks, but that's the price one has to pay for memory safety.
Re: Implications of Rewriting a Browser Component in Rust
#9Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nullpointer exceptions are a huge thing in Java.
I haven't written any Rust in a few years, but last I knew, it was very possible for a Rust program to crash. The guarantee is that it won't corrupt memory while doing so.
That's true, but 'null pointer exceptions' (which I suppose means expecting a Option to contain a &T when it is instead empty) are much rarer since nullability is made explicit.
Rust goals in life towards bugs are basically
- Isolate memory bugs to unsafe code which you rarely write.
- Make as many classes as bugs reasonably possible rarer by encoding as much as is reasonable in the type system and encouraging the programmer to think about all possible cases.
The first gets all the attention because it is the one you can make guarantees about, but the second is really just as important.
Re: Implications of Rewriting a Browser Component in Rust
#10> could have been caught by a run time bounds check And here I thought rust was all about zero cost abstractions.
It's not, that's C++. Rust requires a lot of runtime checks, but that's the price one has to pay for memory safety.
Rust is about zero cost abstraction. Bound checks can be disabled.