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All the core utils have been ported to rust for the redox project, and there are actually superior alternatives in some cases available like ripgrep.

jeffbee 7y ago
rg is great but it isn't a drop-in replacement for POSIX grep, which means even if you have rg you still need to ship another grep so all your existing scripts and programs that expect to be able to invoke POSIX grep don't break.
- empath75 7y ago
  Yeah and there are multiple drop in replacements for grep— he was implying those alternatives didn’t exist because rust wasn’t capable of handling them or people weren’t interesting in writing them, but I think that’s been proven wrong many times over at this point. https://github.com/redox-os/extrautils/blob/master/src/bin/grep.rs https://github.com/redox-os/extrautils/blob/master/src/bin/g...
  - otterley 7y ago
    Was this true in 2017, when the statement was written?
    - masklinn 7y ago
      Both redox's grep and ripgrep (which trivially demonstrates that a grep can be implemented in rust even if it's not a POSIX grep implementation) were created / started in early 2016, so yes. Not to mention Theo's statement is so much weaker than actually successful implementations the existence of these two completely blows through the goal: > There has been no attempt to move the smallest parts of the ecosystem, to provide replacements for base POSIX utilities.
      - otterley 7y ago
        What matters is when they were feature complete, not when the project started. I can't plausibly claim that a program I wrote some code for but isn't at the state of being a viable substitute yet is a "replacement." (And yes, Theo, like many hackers, is prone to exaggeration.)
jacquesm 7y ago
For this to be valid those would have to be 100% drop in replacements, and they are not. 'superior alternatives' are almost by definition not drop-in replacements.

jeffbee 7y ago

rg is great but it isn't a drop-in replacement for POSIX grep, which means even if you have rg you still need to ship another grep so all your existing scripts and programs that expect to be able to invoke POSIX grep don't break.

empath75 7y ago
Yeah and there are multiple drop in replacements for grep— he was implying those alternatives didn’t exist because rust wasn’t capable of handling them or people weren’t interesting in writing them, but I think that’s been proven wrong many times over at this point. https://github.com/redox-os/extrautils/blob/master/src/bin/grep.rs https://github.com/redox-os/extrautils/blob/master/src/bin/g...
- otterley 7y ago
  Was this true in 2017, when the statement was written?
  - masklinn 7y ago
    Both redox's grep and ripgrep (which trivially demonstrates that a grep can be implemented in rust even if it's not a POSIX grep implementation) were created / started in early 2016, so yes. Not to mention Theo's statement is so much weaker than actually successful implementations the existence of these two completely blows through the goal: > There has been no attempt to move the smallest parts of the ecosystem, to provide replacements for base POSIX utilities.
    - otterley 7y ago
      What matters is when they were feature complete, not when the project started. I can't plausibly claim that a program I wrote some code for but isn't at the state of being a viable substitute yet is a "replacement." (And yes, Theo, like many hackers, is prone to exaggeration.)

jacquesm 7y ago

For this to be valid those would have to be 100% drop in replacements, and they are not. 'superior alternatives' are almost by definition not drop-in replacements.