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> would it really be too expensive to invest some time to learn it? I guess it depends on who you are. I find the complexity of Rust, and the community's cultu

> would it really be too expensive to invest some time to learn it? I guess it depends on who you are. I find the complexity of Rust, and the community's cultural acceptance of said complexity, oozes out into every library to make every new thing you try to do seem like another incredibly hard slog. I had one try at Rust a couple of years ago, and gave up. I had another one in the first half of this year, this time intending it for a (personal/hobby) cli app. But again, just found it dispiriting. I wasn't baulking at a single tutorial. I read all the Rust book (and worked through about half of it in detail). I read Jim Blandy's book. Lots of tutorials etc. I went through all of Rustlings. And wrote the first phase of my cli app (it's trivial but fairly robust and I use it daily). I still found it damned hard to get anything done in Rust. I haven't quite given up (mainly out of stubbornness and having some time on my hands), and plan to take up the 2nd phase of my one Rust app. But anyone who finds Rust to be tractable by just 'investing some time to learn it' is living in a different world from mine.

Cyph0n 4y ago
Thanks for sharing your experience. OP in particular seems like someone who is familiar with a variety of languages, hence my comment. In addition, given that their requirements lined up with what Rust is good at, the time investment would be worth it. When it comes to learning Rust in general, I think the difficulty and amount of time required depends on one’s background and overall learning style. If you are the type of person who wants to fully understand why things are the way they are before moving on, the process may likely slow down further. I think Rust is the kind of language where accepting things as they are at first will help you learn quicker. You can always circle back to dig in later. For me personally, it took a couple of tries to “get” Rust. It definitely wasn’t straightforward to learn, but it wasn’t insanely complex either. Again, I think background and learning style contribute here. Best of luck on your learning journey!
- j16sdiz 4y ago
  > given that their requirements lined up with what Rust is good at I would say the opposite. OP stress on the C/C++ interoperability. In rust, you need to either (1) wrap the API in something Rust-like / Borrowchecker-friendly - which need lots of planning ; or (2) Do it with lots of unsafe code - which make the memory safety lots more complicated to reason about For memory safety, you can get it from any GC language without extra mental load.
  - Cyph0n 4y ago
    (1) is a one-time investment and allows you to take advantage of compiler guarantees. (2) is what every other language does for FFI anyways. In Rust, you could have a lightweight wrapper around the C API, but you would lose out on some benefits. OP said performance was critical, so why would they use a GC language?
- aussiesnack 4y ago
  Your response seemed to fall into a category common amongst Rust enthusiasts, which is to assume anyone resistant to the lure is ipso facto lazy or misguided. Your own question was a hint at laziness. I have no idea how much effort the writer put into evaluating Rust. I doubt you do either. I don't know why some of us find Rust difficult. Perhaps it just is, or isn't, or is for some people and not for others, or perhaps we are just thick. My suspicion is that there are more people who do than seem apparent, because they tend to get shut down by the very decorous implications of laziness or stupidity that are so characteristic of the Rust community.
  - Cyph0n 4y ago
    Nowhere did I say or even imply that people are “lazy or misguided” for not learning Rust.
    - aussiesnack 4y ago
      Well I didn't see another way to gloss your question: > would it really be too expensive to invest some time to learn it? I'm entirely happy to take your word that I've misinterpreted the question. Back-and-forth in comments about intended meaning is rarely useful. So my apologies. But the general attitude in the Rust community (of which I have no idea whether or not you're a part) absolutely is "Rust is not hard, and if you find it so, that's a measure of your dysfunction, not a description of the language".
      - Cyph0n 4y ago
        The context for that question is important: OP had a set of requirements and Rust seemed to meet them. I’d personally consider investing time to learn technology X if I found out it met my requirements. This is not a Rust-specific thing. I agree that Rust is not simple to learn. There is a definite learning curve involved, especially at the start. I hope your experience with the community and the language improves going forward.

Cyph0n 4y ago

Thanks for sharing your experience. OP in particular seems like someone who is familiar with a variety of languages, hence my comment. In addition, given that their requirements lined up with what Rust is good at, the time investment would be worth it. When it comes to learning Rust in general, I think the difficulty and amount of time required depends on one’s background and overall learning style. If you are the type of person who wants to fully understand why things are the way they are before moving on, the process may likely slow down further. I think Rust is the kind of language where accepting things as they are at first will help you learn quicker. You can always circle back to dig in later. For me personally, it took a couple of tries to “get” Rust. It definitely wasn’t straightforward to learn, but it wasn’t insanely complex either. Again, I think background and learning style contribute here. Best of luck on your learning journey!

j16sdiz 4y ago
> given that their requirements lined up with what Rust is good at I would say the opposite. OP stress on the C/C++ interoperability. In rust, you need to either (1) wrap the API in something Rust-like / Borrowchecker-friendly - which need lots of planning ; or (2) Do it with lots of unsafe code - which make the memory safety lots more complicated to reason about For memory safety, you can get it from any GC language without extra mental load.
- Cyph0n 4y ago
  (1) is a one-time investment and allows you to take advantage of compiler guarantees. (2) is what every other language does for FFI anyways. In Rust, you could have a lightweight wrapper around the C API, but you would lose out on some benefits. OP said performance was critical, so why would they use a GC language?
aussiesnack 4y ago
Your response seemed to fall into a category common amongst Rust enthusiasts, which is to assume anyone resistant to the lure is ipso facto lazy or misguided. Your own question was a hint at laziness. I have no idea how much effort the writer put into evaluating Rust. I doubt you do either. I don't know why some of us find Rust difficult. Perhaps it just is, or isn't, or is for some people and not for others, or perhaps we are just thick. My suspicion is that there are more people who do than seem apparent, because they tend to get shut down by the very decorous implications of laziness or stupidity that are so characteristic of the Rust community.
- Cyph0n 4y ago
  Nowhere did I say or even imply that people are “lazy or misguided” for not learning Rust.
  - aussiesnack 4y ago
    Well I didn't see another way to gloss your question: > would it really be too expensive to invest some time to learn it? I'm entirely happy to take your word that I've misinterpreted the question. Back-and-forth in comments about intended meaning is rarely useful. So my apologies. But the general attitude in the Rust community (of which I have no idea whether or not you're a part) absolutely is "Rust is not hard, and if you find it so, that's a measure of your dysfunction, not a description of the language".
    - Cyph0n 4y ago
      The context for that question is important: OP had a set of requirements and Rust seemed to meet them. I’d personally consider investing time to learn technology X if I found out it met my requirements. This is not a Rust-specific thing. I agree that Rust is not simple to learn. There is a definite learning curve involved, especially at the start. I hope your experience with the community and the language improves going forward.