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- Hacker News
- Be serious about change, re-write it in Zigby golbez9
- can it be done? C codebase are obviously missing the lifetime information, type-generic arguments are just void*, in/out arguments aren't explicit... or at least, the information is scattered across the codebase, and might be inconsistent. a "safe rust" might not be even possibleby dgan
- Not the same as:
https://github.com/uutils/coreutils
Although I could see them benefitting.
by djoldman - The real difficulty of systems programming in C is due to syscall/POSIX/libc semantics like the interplay between signal handling and async readv/writev resumption. These things are way beyond what the borrow checker and coverage-guided fuzzers can deal with and consist the bulk of vulnerabilities. Rust won't save you from CopyFail; you would need hardcore formal verification like TLA+ coupled with F* /Low* /Pulse to catch it before release. AI (or manual) Rust rewrites of well trodden C code is calling for trouble more than anything else.by learningstud
- Great stuff. Instead of asking and funding the C developers of the respective projects for a port, they go for license washing and stealing.by qew16t
- The Darpa Tractor project looks to achieve the same:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41110269
Just a few weeks back it was judged as unlikely to succeed. Now Canonical want to get in.
by childintime - I have no particular religious preference for a language. One uses what one feels is appropriate.
But, let's say this effort is a complete success. What's next?
Can all the maintainers of the c codebase move over to maintaining (forward) the Rust codebase. Surely there'll be some friction, and losses to friction.
What about deployments, monitoring, support and trouble-shooting? Are the teams that perform those functions now capable of performing those functions in the future? It seems to me that the here-to-there for functional, evolving and reliable systems in the real world has been elided and become simply "a player to be named later".