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Wow, hold up. > Nobody really likes C++ or CMake, and there's no clear path for getting off old toolchains. Every year the pain will get worse. I do like C++

by yazzku 4y ago

Wow, hold up. > Nobody really likes C++ or CMake, and there's no clear path for getting off old toolchains. Every year the pain will get worse. I do like C++ and CMake. Get off 'old' toolchains? Why is 'old' here 'bad'? Both are continuously evolving. 'Old' = proven = works. > C++ is becoming a legacy language and finding contributors in the future will become difficult, while Rust has an active and growing community. How is it becoming a legacy language? This is completely false and unsubstantiated. Yeah, finding good C++ devs is hard, the thing takes skill. > Rust is what we need to turn on concurrent function execution. https://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/language/coroutines https://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/language/coroutines You don't need Rust here. Good try, though. > Being written in Rust will help fish continue to be perceived as modern and relevant. Rewriting something for no reason will for sure turn mature developers off. I've yet to hear a good reason for why you're proposing this rewrite. I'm sure it'll be perceived as very modern and "relevant" though. > This should be thought of as a "port" instead of a "rewrite" because we would not start from scratch; This is like when your ever-high friend says "I can quit anytime, man." You can call it whatever, but it doesn't change the fact of what this is. Total psyops there.

drunkenmagician 4y ago
[flagged]
- DoctorNick 4y ago
  The future is now, old man
- saila 4y ago
  Your comment is quite unnecessarily vitriolic, but I do love the notion that it's possible to become cool by learning a new programming language. Besides, all the common languages we use now, whether or old or new, have all gone through a phase like this. I bet people made similar commentary about C back in the day too.
- friedman23 4y ago
  It's their project so why not...
  - legends2k 4y ago
    Sure, write it in anythinf, just don't give _reasons_. Tell that it's what you feel like. This seems to be GP's comment. I agree.
__jem 4y ago
Why isn't using a language that has a growing community of young developers not a "reason"? They're looking towards the future and making the bet that it will be easier to get new contributors in Rust than in C++. Maybe you disagree with the prospective future of C++, or the feasibility of rewrites, but it hardly seems like "not a reason" to peruse something like this, it seems like a pretty strong one, since as you say "finding good C++ devs is hard" and they're interested in growing the number of contributors in the future.
- dmitrygr 4y ago
  Because, while the sequence "100,000 100,000 100,000 100,000" is stable and "1 2 3 4" is growing, that does not mean that the latter will eclipse the former anytime soon - the point being implied by TFA
  - __jem 4y ago
    I seriously doubt there are 5 orders of magnitude more C++ open source contributors actively participating in projects on GitHub than Rust, which is the relevant question. Enthusiasm counts for projects like this that are looking to stay relevant.
    - fbdab103 4y ago
      At this point, I would love solid numbers on the number of new C++ projects (open source or otherwise) vs Rust. Google just came out indicating how well the transition was working for them with respect to memory vulnerabilities.
      - zozbot234 4y ago
        C++ is simply not intended for new projects in this day and age; even Carbon and cppnew are specifically designed for projects that must interoperate heavily with C++ libraries, and are thus not entirely greenfield in that sense. The Carbon developers have explicitly made it clear that new projects should be written in a safe language if at all viable.
xyzzyz 4y ago
> How is it becoming a legacy language? This is completely false and unsubstantiated. Yeah, finding good C++ devs is hard, the thing takes skill. If getting good developers that know technology X is hard and getting harder over time (which I think is definitely true about C++), this on its own will cause technology X to become legacy.
sockaddr 4y ago
As an old C/C++ dev I'm beyond excited to re-tool as a Rust dev. It's such a pleasure to use compared to C++. Fish porting itself to Rust makes me more likely to contribute to it in the future. /anecdata
dbtc 4y ago
I agree, yet I think rewriting - even for no reason at all - can make the thing better.
- legends2k 4y ago
  https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-never-do-part-i/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-...
orf 4y ago
It’s his project. He sees it that way, as do others. You see it differently. The objective truth is probably somewhere in between. Other projects have seen a significant positive impact after switching to rust. I hope fish shell also sees that impact, regardless of any feelings around rust.
- enedil 4y ago
  As fish user, I can be concerned that a rewrite like this might ruin a project, and consequently oppose such rewrite. Doesn't matter whose project it is. If you think I should just ignore it and "accept decision" - this is when it's clear, that what you really mean is "you just should not care".
  - aldanor 4y ago
    As a fish user, I'd be concerned about the opposite - having a burden of a big c++ codebase and all it's build shenanigans to maintain which is not fun at all anymore could lead to the project becoming stale, especially with a low bus factor. Plus, it could gain new external contributors. Heck, I'd consider contributing myself now whereas I wouldn't consider wasting my time on doing c++ for fun unless it was mission critical for some reason
stcroixx 4y ago
My thoughts exactly. Why would the implementation language bless a piece of software as ‘relevant’? I’d also argue learning how to do for loops in bash, which would let you write them on about any server in any data center on the planet, would serve one much better.
pxc 4y ago
> Rewriting something for no reason will for sure turn mature developers off. I've yet to hear a good reason for why you're proposing this rewrite. I'm sure it'll be perceived as very modern and "relevant" though. Fish has been lovingly maintained by a small group of developers for a long time, and it's an excellent piece of software. The person proposing the Rust port has been the chief maintainer a long time. I don't think you understand the credibility they have with longtime users and contributors.
- legends2k 4y ago
  Not the GP, but I want to point out that while I respect the chief maintainer and not doubt their credibility with fish's users, no one is immune to mental fallacies. GP's comment points out where there's gaps in thinking/logic in the arguments made to do the port. Personally I think the maintainer would've done well both to the community and oneself if the reason given was > Hey, I'm bored, I want to practice Rust and want to do something fun, so I'm doing this. than cloak it with some weak sauce reasons.
ZephyrBlu 4y ago
Something being cool and modern matters a lot more than you seem to believe. Rust is a great language and it's growing in popularity. It's a good choice to get experience with Rust, grow their community and improve the codebase.
- Gigachad 4y ago
  It would be like trying to run a FOSS project in COBOL. No one wants to do that for fun. The bank manages by paying people a fortune to do something they don't want to do.

by yazzku 4y ago

drunkenmagician 4y ago

[flagged]

DoctorNick 4y ago
The future is now, old man
saila 4y ago
Your comment is quite unnecessarily vitriolic, but I do love the notion that it's possible to become cool by learning a new programming language. Besides, all the common languages we use now, whether or old or new, have all gone through a phase like this. I bet people made similar commentary about C back in the day too.
friedman23 4y ago
It's their project so why not...
- legends2k 4y ago
  Sure, write it in anythinf, just don't give _reasons_. Tell that it's what you feel like. This seems to be GP's comment. I agree.

__jem 4y ago

Why isn't using a language that has a growing community of young developers not a "reason"? They're looking towards the future and making the bet that it will be easier to get new contributors in Rust than in C++. Maybe you disagree with the prospective future of C++, or the feasibility of rewrites, but it hardly seems like "not a reason" to peruse something like this, it seems like a pretty strong one, since as you say "finding good C++ devs is hard" and they're interested in growing the number of contributors in the future.

dmitrygr 4y ago
Because, while the sequence "100,000 100,000 100,000 100,000" is stable and "1 2 3 4" is growing, that does not mean that the latter will eclipse the former anytime soon - the point being implied by TFA
- __jem 4y ago
  I seriously doubt there are 5 orders of magnitude more C++ open source contributors actively participating in projects on GitHub than Rust, which is the relevant question. Enthusiasm counts for projects like this that are looking to stay relevant.
  - fbdab103 4y ago
    At this point, I would love solid numbers on the number of new C++ projects (open source or otherwise) vs Rust. Google just came out indicating how well the transition was working for them with respect to memory vulnerabilities.
    - zozbot234 4y ago
      C++ is simply not intended for new projects in this day and age; even Carbon and cppnew are specifically designed for projects that must interoperate heavily with C++ libraries, and are thus not entirely greenfield in that sense. The Carbon developers have explicitly made it clear that new projects should be written in a safe language if at all viable.

xyzzyz 4y ago

> How is it becoming a legacy language? This is completely false and unsubstantiated. Yeah, finding good C++ devs is hard, the thing takes skill. If getting good developers that know technology X is hard and getting harder over time (which I think is definitely true about C++), this on its own will cause technology X to become legacy.

sockaddr 4y ago

As an old C/C++ dev I'm beyond excited to re-tool as a Rust dev. It's such a pleasure to use compared to C++. Fish porting itself to Rust makes me more likely to contribute to it in the future. /anecdata

dbtc 4y ago

I agree, yet I think rewriting - even for no reason at all - can make the thing better.

legends2k 4y ago
https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-never-do-part-i/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-...

orf 4y ago

It’s his project. He sees it that way, as do others. You see it differently. The objective truth is probably somewhere in between. Other projects have seen a significant positive impact after switching to rust. I hope fish shell also sees that impact, regardless of any feelings around rust.

enedil 4y ago
As fish user, I can be concerned that a rewrite like this might ruin a project, and consequently oppose such rewrite. Doesn't matter whose project it is. If you think I should just ignore it and "accept decision" - this is when it's clear, that what you really mean is "you just should not care".
- aldanor 4y ago
  As a fish user, I'd be concerned about the opposite - having a burden of a big c++ codebase and all it's build shenanigans to maintain which is not fun at all anymore could lead to the project becoming stale, especially with a low bus factor. Plus, it could gain new external contributors. Heck, I'd consider contributing myself now whereas I wouldn't consider wasting my time on doing c++ for fun unless it was mission critical for some reason

stcroixx 4y ago

My thoughts exactly. Why would the implementation language bless a piece of software as ‘relevant’? I’d also argue learning how to do for loops in bash, which would let you write them on about any server in any data center on the planet, would serve one much better.

pxc 4y ago

> Rewriting something for no reason will for sure turn mature developers off. I've yet to hear a good reason for why you're proposing this rewrite. I'm sure it'll be perceived as very modern and "relevant" though. Fish has been lovingly maintained by a small group of developers for a long time, and it's an excellent piece of software. The person proposing the Rust port has been the chief maintainer a long time. I don't think you understand the credibility they have with longtime users and contributors.

legends2k 4y ago
Not the GP, but I want to point out that while I respect the chief maintainer and not doubt their credibility with fish's users, no one is immune to mental fallacies. GP's comment points out where there's gaps in thinking/logic in the arguments made to do the port. Personally I think the maintainer would've done well both to the community and oneself if the reason given was > Hey, I'm bored, I want to practice Rust and want to do something fun, so I'm doing this. than cloak it with some weak sauce reasons.

ZephyrBlu 4y ago

Something being cool and modern matters a lot more than you seem to believe. Rust is a great language and it's growing in popularity. It's a good choice to get experience with Rust, grow their community and improve the codebase.

Gigachad 4y ago
It would be like trying to run a FOSS project in COBOL. No one wants to do that for fun. The bank manages by paying people a fortune to do something they don't want to do.