On Rust

Jan 3, 2024    m. Feb 18, 2024    #rust  

Thinking of using Rust as a web backend?

Imagine that TypeScript is like a shitty but versatile truck. It will do all sorts of weird shit, including a godawful toolchain and bundling system, but it is well supported by the community and it will handle whatever you throw at it. A huge pothole in the road? It will somehow manage to come out the other end but it won’t be pretty. It will get to the finish line slowly but surely.

Imagine Go as a nice a quick, but flawed sports car. It’s got some really weird weird shit going on, but it’s undeniably quick and well let you get to the finish line in comfort as long as you have the skill to stop it flipping the fuck over at the slightest touch. That’s because it is not forgiving and will ruin your life if you’re not ultra competent at software architecture concepts.

Now imagine Rust as a sexy fast formula 1 race car. It is geared to be as performant as possible, yet has the sleek, sexy feel that C and C++ lacks. It literally converts every electron coursing through your computer to gold. It’s so good. It’s so damn sexy.

Now imagine the Rust car at the starting line, revving its engines. People are cheering, so excited it will win. They’re popping the champagne already.

Except the Rust car is not on a racetrack to the finish line. It’s a racetrack up your asshole. The car goes in. Then out. Then in. Then out. At incredible speed. Blood is everywhere and you’re basically crying at how amazingly fast it is, it’s so damn cool. Yet your ass is getting ruined.

And that’s why you don’t develop your web backends on Rust unless you know exactly why the fuck you’re doing it. There are very real, excellent use cases for Rust that make it the natural winner. But by god if you’re using it cause you feel like a leet hacker and it’s hype, weighting it as an equivalent choice to something like Ruby on Rails or nodejs, then my god you’re screwed.

The reason people get a bit disgruntled by Rust advocacy is that it’s like a bunch of gay men coming to straight men proselytizing about anal and how it can replace pussy and is completely safe and you don’t have to deal with women. So they bend over, spread open, look back and go “just try” in a very well-meaning way. Only problem is that straight men enjoy pussy, want to make pussy safe and are getting used to and are prepared to live with the hazards of women.

Yeah, going gay is probably a lot safer. No kids. Never for a moment are you worried you’re going to jail soon because of how consent in straight escapades is like undefined behavior; anything can happen if you don’t get it right. There’s probably less drama and it’s more productive in many ways I’m sure.