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Honestly at this point I’ve given in and am now advocating that we rewrite every damned widget from scratch in Rust, because by the time we’re mostly done, my c

Honestly at this point I’ve given in and am now advocating that we rewrite every damned widget from scratch in Rust, because by the time we’re mostly done, my career will be winding down, and seeing that shit still gets pwned like, exactly as much, will be “good TV”. Rust is cool because it’s got a solid-if-slow build story that doesn’t really buy into the otherwise ubiquitous .so brain damage. Rust is cool because Haskell Lego Edition is better than no Haskell at all, and Rust is cool because now that it’s proven affine/linear typing can work, someone will probably get it right soon. But if I can buy shares in: “shit still gets rocked constantly”, I’d like to know where.

axiosgunnar 5y ago
> Haskell Lego Edition Gatekeeping much?
- benreesman 5y ago
  I took the time to learn Rust well in spite of how annoying the Jehovas Witness routine has been for like, what, 5-10 years now? I worked with Carl and Yehuda both on the project right before Cargo (which is pretty solid, those guys don’t fuck around). I think I’ve paid my cover-fee on an opinion.
  - benreesman 5y ago
    Do you have a different opinion on whether or not syntax for a clumsy Maybe/Either Monad is a bit awkward? Do you think that trait-bound semantics are as clean as proper type classes as concerns trying to get some gas mileage out of ad-hoc polymorphism? Do you think that the Rust folks might have scored a three-pointer on beating the Haskell folks to PITA-but-useable affine types? Or were you just dissing knowing things?
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
xavxav 5y ago
> Honestly at this point I’ve given in and am now advocating that we rewrite every damned widget from scratch in Rust, because by the time we’re mostly done, my career will be winding down, and seeing that shit still gets pwned like, exactly as much, will be “good TV”. Rust won't solve logic bugs but it can help bring up the foundations. So long as memory safety bugs are so pervasive we can't even properly reason on a theoretical level about logic bugs. The core theorem of any type system is "type safety" which states that a well-typed program never goes wrong (gets stuck, aka UB). Only then can you properly tackle correctness issues. > Rust is cool because Haskell Lego Edition is better than no Haskell at all, and Rust is cool because now that it’s proven affine/linear typing can work, someone will probably get it right soon. I don't understand the condescending remarks about "Haskell Lego Edition". I do agree that Rust has shown that substructural type systems work and are useful, and that they will be a 'theme' in the next batch of languages (or I can hope).
- benreesman 5y ago
  How much do I win if I can panic Rust without any “unsafe” whatsoever? Maybe I’ll index into some Unicode or something, haven’t decided.
  - benreesman 5y ago
    And frankly I don’t see how it’s even remotely fair to call a no-nonsense statement that some things are simplified versions of other things with a cheeky metaphor “condescending”. I could just as easily throw around words like “anti-intellectual” if my goal was to distract from the point rather substantially replying.
    - kibwen 5y ago
      But Rust isn't remotely a simplified version of Haskell, and I'm not sure where you got that impression. It's inspired by several languages, but is predominantly a descendant of ML and C++. The only similarity they have is that Rust traits resemble Haskell typeclasses, but even there they are quite different in semantics and implementation.
lionkor 5y ago
The flaw in the idea of "rewrite it in rust" is that, next to the memory issues, the biggest issues are logic bugs. Rewriting something from scratch isnt going to magically not have bugs, and the legacy system likely has many edge cases covered that a modern new implementation will have to learn about first.
- Taywee 5y ago
  An improvement is an improvement. A flaw of seatbelts is that some people still die when they wear them. That's not a valid argument to not wear seatbelts.
- xavxav 5y ago
  Right, but a memory unsafety but is what takes a harmless logic bug in an image parser with no filesystem access to an RCE and sandbox escape. Memory unsafety allows you to change the 'category' of the bug, you become free to do whatever whereas a logic bug forces to to work within the (flawed) logic of the original program.
  - saagarjha 5y ago
    Not necessarily; see https://github.com/LinusHenze/Fugu14/blob/master/Writeup.pdf https://github.com/LinusHenze/Fugu14/blob/master/Writeup.pdf for example. It's a full chain that repeatedly escalates privileges without exploiting any memory safety bugs by tricking privileged subsystems into giving it more access than it should have, all the way up through and beyond kernel code execution.
    - jquery 5y ago
      That’s not a zero-click vulnerability though. I didn’t read the entire pdf but 2 of the first 4 steps involve active user participation and assistance (install exploit app 1 and exploit app 2). I think regardless, you’re right, we will still have logic bugs… but that example is also an “exception proves the rule” kind of thing.
      - 5y ago
qualudeheart 5y ago
Mass rewrites will be quite the jobs program. I’m on board. Converted to Marxism not long ago.
omegalulw 5y ago
Do you imagine how long it would take to compile the Linux kernel if it were rust only? Not to mention the kernel has to allow for third party closed source stuff like drivers, wouldn't that force you to allow unsafe Rust and put you back to square one?
- dtech 5y ago
  That seems an insignificant price to pay if it would truly provide the promised benefits (big if). Even most Linux users don't compile the kernel themselves, and the 5% that do care can afford the time and/or computing resources.

axiosgunnar 5y ago

> Haskell Lego Edition Gatekeeping much?

benreesman 5y ago
I took the time to learn Rust well in spite of how annoying the Jehovas Witness routine has been for like, what, 5-10 years now? I worked with Carl and Yehuda both on the project right before Cargo (which is pretty solid, those guys don’t fuck around). I think I’ve paid my cover-fee on an opinion.
- benreesman 5y ago
  Do you have a different opinion on whether or not syntax for a clumsy Maybe/Either Monad is a bit awkward? Do you think that trait-bound semantics are as clean as proper type classes as concerns trying to get some gas mileage out of ad-hoc polymorphism? Do you think that the Rust folks might have scored a three-pointer on beating the Haskell folks to PITA-but-useable affine types? Or were you just dissing knowing things?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

xavxav 5y ago

> Honestly at this point I’ve given in and am now advocating that we rewrite every damned widget from scratch in Rust, because by the time we’re mostly done, my career will be winding down, and seeing that shit still gets pwned like, exactly as much, will be “good TV”. Rust won't solve logic bugs but it can help bring up the foundations. So long as memory safety bugs are so pervasive we can't even properly reason on a theoretical level about logic bugs. The core theorem of any type system is "type safety" which states that a well-typed program never goes wrong (gets stuck, aka UB). Only then can you properly tackle correctness issues. > Rust is cool because Haskell Lego Edition is better than no Haskell at all, and Rust is cool because now that it’s proven affine/linear typing can work, someone will probably get it right soon. I don't understand the condescending remarks about "Haskell Lego Edition". I do agree that Rust has shown that substructural type systems work and are useful, and that they will be a 'theme' in the next batch of languages (or I can hope).

benreesman 5y ago
How much do I win if I can panic Rust without any “unsafe” whatsoever? Maybe I’ll index into some Unicode or something, haven’t decided.
- benreesman 5y ago
  And frankly I don’t see how it’s even remotely fair to call a no-nonsense statement that some things are simplified versions of other things with a cheeky metaphor “condescending”. I could just as easily throw around words like “anti-intellectual” if my goal was to distract from the point rather substantially replying.
  - kibwen 5y ago
    But Rust isn't remotely a simplified version of Haskell, and I'm not sure where you got that impression. It's inspired by several languages, but is predominantly a descendant of ML and C++. The only similarity they have is that Rust traits resemble Haskell typeclasses, but even there they are quite different in semantics and implementation.

lionkor 5y ago

The flaw in the idea of "rewrite it in rust" is that, next to the memory issues, the biggest issues are logic bugs. Rewriting something from scratch isnt going to magically not have bugs, and the legacy system likely has many edge cases covered that a modern new implementation will have to learn about first.

Taywee 5y ago
An improvement is an improvement. A flaw of seatbelts is that some people still die when they wear them. That's not a valid argument to not wear seatbelts.
xavxav 5y ago
Right, but a memory unsafety but is what takes a harmless logic bug in an image parser with no filesystem access to an RCE and sandbox escape. Memory unsafety allows you to change the 'category' of the bug, you become free to do whatever whereas a logic bug forces to to work within the (flawed) logic of the original program.
- saagarjha 5y ago
  Not necessarily; see https://github.com/LinusHenze/Fugu14/blob/master/Writeup.pdf https://github.com/LinusHenze/Fugu14/blob/master/Writeup.pdf for example. It's a full chain that repeatedly escalates privileges without exploiting any memory safety bugs by tricking privileged subsystems into giving it more access than it should have, all the way up through and beyond kernel code execution.
  - jquery 5y ago
    That’s not a zero-click vulnerability though. I didn’t read the entire pdf but 2 of the first 4 steps involve active user participation and assistance (install exploit app 1 and exploit app 2). I think regardless, you’re right, we will still have logic bugs… but that example is also an “exception proves the rule” kind of thing.
    - 5y ago

qualudeheart 5y ago

Mass rewrites will be quite the jobs program. I’m on board. Converted to Marxism not long ago.

omegalulw 5y ago

Do you imagine how long it would take to compile the Linux kernel if it were rust only? Not to mention the kernel has to allow for third party closed source stuff like drivers, wouldn't that force you to allow unsafe Rust and put you back to square one?

dtech 5y ago
That seems an insignificant price to pay if it would truly provide the promised benefits (big if). Even most Linux users don't compile the kernel themselves, and the 5% that do care can afford the time and/or computing resources.