Rust - Introduction
Rust is a systems level programming language, developed by Graydon Hoare. Mozilla Labs later acquired the programme.
Application v/s Systems Programming Languages
Application programming languages like Java/C# are used to build software, which provide services to the user directly. They help us build business applications like spreadsheets, word processors, web applications or mobile applications.
Systems programming languages like C/C++ are used to build software and software platforms. They can be used to build operating systems, game engines, compilers, etc. These programming languages require a great degree of hardware interaction.
Systems and application programming languages face two major problems −
- It is difficult to write secure code.
- It is difficult to write multi-threaded code.
Why Rust?
Rust focuses on three goals −
The language was designed for developing highly reliable and fast software in a simple way. Rust can be used to write high-level programs down to hardware-specific programs.
Performance
Rust programming language does not have a Garbage Collector (GC) by design. This improves the performance at runtime.
Memory safety at compile time
Software built using Rust is safe from memory issues like dangling pointers, buffer overruns and memory leaks.
Multi-threaded applications
Rust’s ownership and memory safety rules provide concurrency without data races.
Support for Web Assembly (WASM)
Web Assembly helps to execute high computation intensive algorithms in the browser, on embedded devices, or anywhere else. It runs at the speed of native code. Rust can be compiled to Web Assembly for fast, reliable execution.
