Rust 0.4 call for testing (opens in new tab)

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88 pointsstalled13y ago14 comments

14 comments

I am quite impressed with the design of Rust. For any strongly typed-language, I am always curious about how it handles generics. Most new languages will take in functional language features now a days and so does Rust. But, I think its killer feature is easier generics. C++, Java and to some extent, Scala have not been successful in taming the complexity that gets introduced while supporting generics. I think Rust with its prototype-like take on generics similar to Go, but still remaining strongly-typed, is a great design. I will be curious to know what you guys think about that.

radarsat113y ago

Generics are great, but Rust's killer feature is regions, (Variable lifetime semantics), and, maybe moreso, its memory ownership semantics (e.g. reference borrowing). These aren't strictly separate features, they work together nicely. What I'm looking forward to is discovering how these features Will allow me to express some deeper aspects of what I _mean_ when coding, and have the compiler statically perform sanity checks for me.

dmpk2k13y ago

There are a number of languages with support for generics. If easier generics was Rust's claim to fame, it would have quietly disappeared into LtU-land, never to be seen again.

Luckily, there's a lot more to Rust than that. Killer feature generics aren't.

rohshall13y ago

Why do you think easier generics is not that important? I find that complexity of a statically compiled language increases manifold because of the way they handle generics. Do you think complexity does not increase or do you think complexity is not a criterion for success of a language?

2 more replies

dbaupp13y ago

From what I can see, rust is borrow more functional language features: its generics implementation seems to be similar to Haskell's type classes.

masklinn13y ago

Even more functional-ish features: most block-based constructs are actually parse transforms on top of HoFs. For instance

    for 5.times {
        // code
    }

desugars to:

    // |args*| { stmt* } is the Rust block syntax
    times(5, || {
        // code
        true // explicit order to continue
    })

1 more reply

stalledOP13y ago

changes: https://github.com/mozilla/rust/wiki/Doc-detailed-release-no...

colanderman13y ago

Is typestate still in? I read somewhere it was coming out in 0.4 but I don't see anything about it in the release notes. I think it's one of Rust's most interesting features and hope it does stay put.

pcwalton13y ago

No, typestate has been removed from the language. However, you can get a lot of its functionality with session types.

ksec13y ago

Would the Final Name still be called Rust? Or is it a code name only?

abrowne13y ago

They have a logo, so I'm thinking it's final: http://www.rust-lang.org/

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

14 comments

rohshall13y ago

radarsat113y ago

dmpk2k13y ago

There are a number of languages with support for generics. If easier generics was Rust's claim to fame, it would have quietly disappeared into LtU-land, never to be seen again.

Luckily, there's a lot more to Rust than that. Killer feature generics aren't.

rohshall13y ago

2 more replies

dbaupp13y ago

From what I can see, rust is borrow more functional language features: its generics implementation seems to be similar to Haskell's type classes.

masklinn13y ago

Even more functional-ish features: most block-based constructs are actually parse transforms on top of HoFs. For instance

    for 5.times {
        // code
    }

desugars to:

    // |args*| { stmt* } is the Rust block syntax
    times(5, || {
        // code
        true // explicit order to continue
    })

1 more reply

stalledOP13y ago

changes: https://github.com/mozilla/rust/wiki/Doc-detailed-release-no...

colanderman13y ago

pcwalton13y ago

No, typestate has been removed from the language. However, you can get a lot of its functionality with session types.

ksec13y ago

Would the Final Name still be called Rust? Or is it a code name only?

abrowne13y ago

They have a logo, so I'm thinking it's final: http://www.rust-lang.org/

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse