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I haven't coded in either¹, but I got the impression that Rust tries to supersede C++, and that Zig tries to supersede C, and that they're both slowly getting t

I haven't coded in either¹, but I got the impression that Rust tries to supersede C++, and that Zig tries to supersede C, and that they're both slowly getting there. Is that a bad oversimplification? ¹ nor seriously coded in C++ in a long time, for that matter, so take this statement as an outsider impression

oleganza 5y ago
Not sure about Zig, but Rust is a pretty successful replacement for C++ by and for all the people who want low-level efficiency of C/C++ but with safety guarantees and reasonable semantics that can be understood without long and painful training.
- spyremeown 5y ago
  I really want to take a good look at Rust... it does seem to have very reasonable syntax and cargo looks nice.
  - eska 5y ago
    The bigger sell to me is that you can actually give safe rust code to a newcomer, and they won’t cut themselves on the most basic of tasks. Code review and work delegation have become soooo much easier for me as software dev lead.
- pjmlp 5y ago
  It is a successful language, a successful C++ replacement remains to be seen, as per companies whose SDKs favour only C, C++ and their managed stacks.
flooow 5y ago
Do people really think Rust isn't a replacement for C? For the work I do - optimisation algorithms that must run As Fast As Possible - it absolutely is a much-superior replacement for C. I think what people mean is that Rust violates their perception of what C 'is' - 'simple, bare-metal, low-abstraction'. Well I don't think C is any of these things and Rust's memory model (borrow-checker) is a much more explicit and precise representation of the actual (implicit, undocumented) invariants of your C program. In that sense it is 'simpler'.
- vanderZwan 5y ago
  To reword what you are saying in a slightly less dismissive tone: there are a lot people who stick to C because they don't like the added complexity of C++ (real or perceived). The same people are likely to look at Rust and perceive a lot of added complexity on their first impression, while also already feeling comfortable with C's complexity. With that combination switching over becomes a hard sell. Meanwhile Zig has a lot less perceived complexity, and most of it appears to be similar enough to the "C complexity" that C programmers are already familiar to not scare them off. (Again, I'm just giving outsider impression of someone who just read a ton of blog posts and basic tutorials + standard library stuff without really coding in either language)
  - nicoburns 5y ago
    I think this is definitely a reasonable take. Having said that, Rust is not quite as complex as C++ so a lot of people who have rejected C++ are more open to Rust (the linux kernel being a prominent example).
    - pron 5y ago
      > Rust is not quite as complex as C++ Yet. C++ wasn't as complex as C++ back when it was Rust's age. It wasn't even as complex as Rust. But if you pick a language for the next 20-30 years, you don't just care about where it is now, but also about where it is headed.
      - tialaramex 5y ago
        If you get things right first time, you don't need to add as much complexity on the journey to ship something usable. This is obviously easier coming from behind. You simply don't have to (and shouldn't) repeat other people's mistakes. > It wasn't even as complex as Rust I'm particularly dubious about this claim. Even counting from the genesis of C++ rather than standardisation, yet counting Rust as starting only in 2015, C++ after six years not only has multiple inheritance and overloading of everything, it also already has templates. That's a lot of complexity.
jandrewrogers 5y ago
I think Rust has an ambition to supersede C++ but in its current form it has only superseded C. C++ is still a significantly more expressive than Rust, which limits the ability of Rust to replace it.
- deleted 5y ago
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oleganza 5y ago

Not sure about Zig, but Rust is a pretty successful replacement for C++ by and for all the people who want low-level efficiency of C/C++ but with safety guarantees and reasonable semantics that can be understood without long and painful training.

spyremeown 5y ago
I really want to take a good look at Rust... it does seem to have very reasonable syntax and cargo looks nice.
- eska 5y ago
  The bigger sell to me is that you can actually give safe rust code to a newcomer, and they won’t cut themselves on the most basic of tasks. Code review and work delegation have become soooo much easier for me as software dev lead.
pjmlp 5y ago
It is a successful language, a successful C++ replacement remains to be seen, as per companies whose SDKs favour only C, C++ and their managed stacks.

flooow 5y ago

Do people really think Rust isn't a replacement for C? For the work I do - optimisation algorithms that must run As Fast As Possible - it absolutely is a much-superior replacement for C. I think what people mean is that Rust violates their perception of what C 'is' - 'simple, bare-metal, low-abstraction'. Well I don't think C is any of these things and Rust's memory model (borrow-checker) is a much more explicit and precise representation of the actual (implicit, undocumented) invariants of your C program. In that sense it is 'simpler'.

vanderZwan 5y ago
To reword what you are saying in a slightly less dismissive tone: there are a lot people who stick to C because they don't like the added complexity of C++ (real or perceived). The same people are likely to look at Rust and perceive a lot of added complexity on their first impression, while also already feeling comfortable with C's complexity. With that combination switching over becomes a hard sell. Meanwhile Zig has a lot less perceived complexity, and most of it appears to be similar enough to the "C complexity" that C programmers are already familiar to not scare them off. (Again, I'm just giving outsider impression of someone who just read a ton of blog posts and basic tutorials + standard library stuff without really coding in either language)
- nicoburns 5y ago
  I think this is definitely a reasonable take. Having said that, Rust is not quite as complex as C++ so a lot of people who have rejected C++ are more open to Rust (the linux kernel being a prominent example).
  - pron 5y ago
    > Rust is not quite as complex as C++ Yet. C++ wasn't as complex as C++ back when it was Rust's age. It wasn't even as complex as Rust. But if you pick a language for the next 20-30 years, you don't just care about where it is now, but also about where it is headed.
    - tialaramex 5y ago
      If you get things right first time, you don't need to add as much complexity on the journey to ship something usable. This is obviously easier coming from behind. You simply don't have to (and shouldn't) repeat other people's mistakes. > It wasn't even as complex as Rust I'm particularly dubious about this claim. Even counting from the genesis of C++ rather than standardisation, yet counting Rust as starting only in 2015, C++ after six years not only has multiple inheritance and overloading of everything, it also already has templates. That's a lot of complexity.

jandrewrogers 5y ago

I think Rust has an ambition to supersede C++ but in its current form it has only superseded C. C++ is still a significantly more expressive than Rust, which limits the ability of Rust to replace it.

deleted 5y ago
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