5 ms·

It's going to be really great as Rust spreads further and further into the embedded world. I know enough C to get by, but I'm always second guessing myself when

It's going to be really great as Rust spreads further and further into the embedded world. I know enough C to get by, but I'm always second guessing myself when things start to get complicated, and Rust has really made lowish-level programming a lot easier for me. The safety features in addition to exposing a C ABI make it a great language for build once, run everywhere (everywhere that LLVM supports, anyway). Exciting times.

lacampbell 10y ago
Is rust actually used in the embedded world, anywhere? All sorts of languages have been made to run on micro controllers, from Pascal to Scheme.
- scandox 10y ago
  Got talking to a dude on the phone (random call about something totally non-technical). Turned out he was an embedded systems engineer in the Nuclear industry. Uses Forth for everything. He strongly encouraged me to use it for any embedded hobby project.
  - jlewallen 10y ago
    JeeLabs has some stuff on Forth in the uC world: http://jeelabs.org/2016/02/dive-into-forth/ http://jeelabs.org/2016/02/dive-into-forth/
    - lacampbell 10y ago
      damn that looks fun. as if I didn't already have enough things I want to learn...
    - swah 10y ago
      I love that jeelabs blog.. Also, some languages running on esp8266: https://github.com/yesco/esp-lisp https://github.com/yesco/esp-lisp https://github.com/zeroflag/punyforth https://github.com/zeroflag/punyforth https://micropython.org/ https://micropython.org/ (and of course lua which i didn't try because its official... https://github.com/nodemcu/nodemcu-firmware https://github.com/nodemcu/nodemcu-firmware)
  - swah 10y ago
    Charles Moore?
- nine_k 10y ago
  Not many languages can be made to run efficiently on a 83 MHz core with few kbytes of RAM. Pascal, maybe, but it's about the same thing as C. Scheme would be nice, but it's both more resource-hungry and the static checking is sort of bolted on. With Rust's security features I hope we'll have fewer crashing or crackable embedded devices.
  - pjmlp 10y ago
    Pascal, these guys have options for almost all relevant processors. http://www.mikroe.com/mikropascal/ http://www.mikroe.com/mikropascal/ Scheme, do people actually know how powerful RTL8710 is in regards to the computers used to create Scheme? RTL8710 has a ARM Cortex M3 @ 166 MHz with 48KB available to user and 1MB flash. Scheme was developed on the ITS OS, running on PDP-10, which could have up to 256 kilowords (not KB), and ran at about 30 MHz. I am with you on Rust. The majority of these tiny devices have more resources than 70's mainframes, that used safer systems programming languages.
TickleSteve 10y ago
Unfortunately, there's little chance for Rust to make inroads into the embedded market, tho I wish it were otherwise. C++ has had many benefits over C for embedded s/w for many years and has similarly failed. Note that contrary to popular belief, C++ does not result in larger, more inefficient s/w than C (for the correct C++ subset). The momentum behind the C ecosystem is so overwhelming that Rust simply will not get a foothold anytime soon.
- nine_k 10y ago
  What makes the ecosystem so unfriendly to languages that link to C easily, either way?
  - nickpsecurity 10y ago
    The ecosystem... from people to compilers to libraries to tutorials... is all C and its style of doing things. Gotta be as close to it as possible to have a chance. It's why the successful languages in enterprise, system space used C-like syntax. Still took a huge company basically dictating it.
  - pjmlp 10y ago
    The culture, the outdated compilers (expect C89 and C++98) and software designed by hardware engineers.
- petra 10y ago
  What about ARM's mbed bet(and ARM know their stuff) , written in c++ ? no chance for it sucseeding in the IOT , yet ARM claim a large ecosystem ?
  - TickleSteve 10y ago
    mbed is not a large ecosystem, its large in the 'IoT' world, but no one doing real embedded work (more than say half a million units) would use mbed.
    - 10y ago

lacampbell 10y ago

Is rust actually used in the embedded world, anywhere? All sorts of languages have been made to run on micro controllers, from Pascal to Scheme.

scandox 10y ago
Got talking to a dude on the phone (random call about something totally non-technical). Turned out he was an embedded systems engineer in the Nuclear industry. Uses Forth for everything. He strongly encouraged me to use it for any embedded hobby project.
- jlewallen 10y ago
  JeeLabs has some stuff on Forth in the uC world: http://jeelabs.org/2016/02/dive-into-forth/ http://jeelabs.org/2016/02/dive-into-forth/
  - lacampbell 10y ago
    damn that looks fun. as if I didn't already have enough things I want to learn...
  - swah 10y ago
    I love that jeelabs blog.. Also, some languages running on esp8266: https://github.com/yesco/esp-lisp https://github.com/yesco/esp-lisp https://github.com/zeroflag/punyforth https://github.com/zeroflag/punyforth https://micropython.org/ https://micropython.org/ (and of course lua which i didn't try because its official... https://github.com/nodemcu/nodemcu-firmware https://github.com/nodemcu/nodemcu-firmware)
- swah 10y ago
  Charles Moore?
nine_k 10y ago
Not many languages can be made to run efficiently on a 83 MHz core with few kbytes of RAM. Pascal, maybe, but it's about the same thing as C. Scheme would be nice, but it's both more resource-hungry and the static checking is sort of bolted on. With Rust's security features I hope we'll have fewer crashing or crackable embedded devices.
- pjmlp 10y ago
  Pascal, these guys have options for almost all relevant processors. http://www.mikroe.com/mikropascal/ http://www.mikroe.com/mikropascal/ Scheme, do people actually know how powerful RTL8710 is in regards to the computers used to create Scheme? RTL8710 has a ARM Cortex M3 @ 166 MHz with 48KB available to user and 1MB flash. Scheme was developed on the ITS OS, running on PDP-10, which could have up to 256 kilowords (not KB), and ran at about 30 MHz. I am with you on Rust. The majority of these tiny devices have more resources than 70's mainframes, that used safer systems programming languages.

TickleSteve 10y ago

Unfortunately, there's little chance for Rust to make inroads into the embedded market, tho I wish it were otherwise. C++ has had many benefits over C for embedded s/w for many years and has similarly failed. Note that contrary to popular belief, C++ does not result in larger, more inefficient s/w than C (for the correct C++ subset). The momentum behind the C ecosystem is so overwhelming that Rust simply will not get a foothold anytime soon.

nine_k 10y ago
What makes the ecosystem so unfriendly to languages that link to C easily, either way?
- nickpsecurity 10y ago
  The ecosystem... from people to compilers to libraries to tutorials... is all C and its style of doing things. Gotta be as close to it as possible to have a chance. It's why the successful languages in enterprise, system space used C-like syntax. Still took a huge company basically dictating it.
- pjmlp 10y ago
  The culture, the outdated compilers (expect C89 and C++98) and software designed by hardware engineers.
petra 10y ago
What about ARM's mbed bet(and ARM know their stuff) , written in c++ ? no chance for it sucseeding in the IOT , yet ARM claim a large ecosystem ?
- TickleSteve 10y ago
  mbed is not a large ecosystem, its large in the 'IoT' world, but no one doing real embedded work (more than say half a million units) would use mbed.
  - 10y ago