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I'm at the point of wishing for the Rust experiment in the Linux kernel to be over. It's become an over-dramatic culture clash of a distraction, taking away fro

by rc00 2y ago

I'm at the point of wishing for the Rust experiment in the Linux kernel to be over. It's become an over-dramatic culture clash of a distraction, taking away from the valuable time that the already over-burdened kernel developers have available. Combine that with the veiled threats and passive aggressive tone of the email and it is all a turn-off. Let the Rust folks go off and do their own kernel project(s). If they can come up with something feasibly better, it will be adopted and they can displace the current C-based Linux kernel. Based on what I've seen of Rust and the crowd that has taken to it, this does not seem a likely outcome. (Worse yet, maintainers are dropping Rust packages for practical reasons.) Still, they should try so that they can see for themselves while leaving the current developers to their existing affairs. Like parents separating two fighting children, both sides of this need to be pulled away and kept separated. The Rust crowd can go off and have their own project(s) and the Linux kernel can continue being only C-based. And never the twain shall meet. If the Rust crowd manages to build something better, it will replace the alternative. If not, they need to accept the reasons why without pleading to social media masses. We've seen PipeWire come along and replace PulseAudio. We've seen X11 keep a stronghold over Wayland. To the Rust crowd, focus your energy on building something somewhere else that you feel is better. To the Linux kernel developer crowd, it's time to move on from this experiment for everyone's peace of mind.

MiguelX413 2y ago
If Linux is to remain exclusively in the terrible memory unsafe language known as C, then I'm afraid I'll have to switch from Linux, which I've been daily driving for a decade now.
still_grokking 2y ago
I don't think this would go well for Linux. The companies actually paying for the kernel development want Rust. That's a matter of fact. Just see who's sponsoring the Linux Foundation, and check what they said elsewhere about their long term commitment to Rust. The main sponsors would likely just fork Linux should Rust be removed again. Than Linux would be left with "community contributions" and the trademarks, but all the big money would go to the fork. Of course nothing like that will happen. Because Linus knows very well where the money is coming from.
- rc00 2y ago
  > The companies actually paying for the kernel development want Rust. That's a matter of fact. Okay, I've researched this quite a bit and it is totally false. Companies paying for kernel development are on older kernel versions and want certain features/fixes backported to their kernels. As of today, those backports are only supported in one language, C.
  - 0dayz 2y ago
    Because backporting is the same as writing drivers??
    - rc00 2y ago
      When the drivers are being written with compatibility in mind for the older kernels... yes? Would you prefer that the overworked maintainers write them twice in two completely different languages? Look at RHEL 9. That shipped with kernel 5.14. For companies that are getting newer hardware or want capabilities that aren't available in 5.14, what do you think they would be paying for?
- rc00 2y ago
  > The companies actually paying for the kernel development want Rust. That's a matter of fact. This is news to me. Are there any actual grants or contracts that stipulate this? Can you provide any links to that effect? > Just see who's sponsoring the Linux Foundation, and check what they said elsewhere about their long term commitment to Rust. Is it the same people at these corporations? Are you assuming companies with five or six figures of employees have a unified stance on this? Or anything? If there was such a commitment to Rust, why not pull funding and cut a check to Redox? Or shift funds gradually over time? This is a head-scratching statement. > The main sponsors would likely just fork Linux should Rust be removed again. This is an asinine take. Three decades and millions of lines of code will not be simply forked overnight. These are the kinds of veiled threats that need to stop, especially when attached to such delusional levels of toxic wishful thinking. Arguing in bad faith is destructive to the overall conversation.

by rc00 2y ago

MiguelX413 2y ago

If Linux is to remain exclusively in the terrible memory unsafe language known as C, then I'm afraid I'll have to switch from Linux, which I've been daily driving for a decade now.

still_grokking 2y ago

I don't think this would go well for Linux. The companies actually paying for the kernel development want Rust. That's a matter of fact. Just see who's sponsoring the Linux Foundation, and check what they said elsewhere about their long term commitment to Rust. The main sponsors would likely just fork Linux should Rust be removed again. Than Linux would be left with "community contributions" and the trademarks, but all the big money would go to the fork. Of course nothing like that will happen. Because Linus knows very well where the money is coming from.

rc00 2y ago
> The companies actually paying for the kernel development want Rust. That's a matter of fact. Okay, I've researched this quite a bit and it is totally false. Companies paying for kernel development are on older kernel versions and want certain features/fixes backported to their kernels. As of today, those backports are only supported in one language, C.
- 0dayz 2y ago
  Because backporting is the same as writing drivers??
  - rc00 2y ago
    When the drivers are being written with compatibility in mind for the older kernels... yes? Would you prefer that the overworked maintainers write them twice in two completely different languages? Look at RHEL 9. That shipped with kernel 5.14. For companies that are getting newer hardware or want capabilities that aren't available in 5.14, what do you think they would be paying for?
rc00 2y ago
> The companies actually paying for the kernel development want Rust. That's a matter of fact. This is news to me. Are there any actual grants or contracts that stipulate this? Can you provide any links to that effect? > Just see who's sponsoring the Linux Foundation, and check what they said elsewhere about their long term commitment to Rust. Is it the same people at these corporations? Are you assuming companies with five or six figures of employees have a unified stance on this? Or anything? If there was such a commitment to Rust, why not pull funding and cut a check to Redox? Or shift funds gradually over time? This is a head-scratching statement. > The main sponsors would likely just fork Linux should Rust be removed again. This is an asinine take. Three decades and millions of lines of code will not be simply forked overnight. These are the kinds of veiled threats that need to stop, especially when attached to such delusional levels of toxic wishful thinking. Arguing in bad faith is destructive to the overall conversation.