For Linus, this is pretty tame. He's certainly mellowed in time. He's even become more diplomatic.
Linus goes on a bit of a rant...
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Brickwizard
Well-Known Member
Tame yes very, If you are as narked as Linus appears to be, then the whole mail could have been said in a blunt message no longer than 4 lines,
[I sense some form of elitism creeping into the Kernel development team]
OP
It has always been there.
Well, it has been there for a large percentage of the time Linux has existed.
He has tamed over the years. Some folks refer to him as being the adult in a room full of kindergarteners.
He has had some legendary rants over the years. I am subscribed to the mailing list. It's filtered to a separate folder and not filling up my inbox folder. I didn't catch this one personally but found it on Slashdot.
Also, there are a bunch of great reasons to use Rust. It can eliminate many of the security incidents, of which there are many (see the last thread I started in the Security section).
Alas, not everybody wants to learn Rust or use Rust. "I've used C for 30 years! I'm not changing!" Someone could rewrite their code in Rust and then merge it with the kernel but then they'd be pretty much obligated to maintain it. I suspect that will happen (it already does) more often as time moves forward. Then, something better than Rust will come along and we'll get to see it all over again.
Condobloke
Well-Known Member
Tame....perhaps. The end of the "conversation", perhaps not.
Any second instalment would be well worth a read.
Any second instalment would be well worth a read.
OP
You should be able to scroll down and read the rest of the email thread, along with the other replies.
Even if you don't comment (and you probably shouldn't, as you're not a kernel developer - nor am I), the Linux Kernel Mailing List may be of interest to you. You can sign up for it with an email address.
Be aware that it can be a pretty high volume of mail, so I'd suggest filtering it to its own folder.
Also, there will be a lot that you probably don't quite understand. There's often a lot of stuff that I don't understand and, as far as I know, you're not a programmer that works with the kernel. So, there's jargon and code snippets that make my eyes glaze over. I presume it'll be similar for you.
But, there's also a lot that you will understand and it may be of interest to you to see where the kernel is going. It may also help people appreciate how complicated the kernel is these days. It's a huge project with millions of lines of code. It is humanly impossible to understand the whole thing. It is also why there's a lot of paid development going on.
As an aside, Rust is safer but it's also supported because the kernel needs to constantly bring in new-blood. Younger people are often learning Rust in their university instead of C. C is like 50+ years old these days, something like that. Rust is much newer and easier to work with - while giving you more security by default.
NOTE: Some of the above is what I've learned from people more adept than I am. While I have programmed in C, I have only superficial knowledge when it comes to Rust. I've also long-since been out of the security game, though I do try to keep my finger on the pulse because I have servers and sites that I like to keep secure.
CaffeineAddict
Well-Known Member
I agree with Linus to some degree. (to some degree because he rants on C++ as well)
There is only very few (non web) languages I personally consider a standard and worth learning or using.
And this are C, C++, assembly and python
These are enough and advanced to make anything you'll ever want without language or hardware limitations.
People who try to impose new standards are simply born in bad time, which is modern age, an age where simplicity rules over performance, an age where doing less work if favorable over quality work.
Any other language simply sucks, is bloatware language, and there is no reason for them to exist.
There is only very few (non web) languages I personally consider a standard and worth learning or using.
And this are C, C++, assembly and python
These are enough and advanced to make anything you'll ever want without language or hardware limitations.
People who try to impose new standards are simply born in bad time, which is modern age, an age where simplicity rules over performance, an age where doing less work if favorable over quality work.
Any other language simply sucks, is bloatware language, and there is no reason for them to exist.
OP
Umm... Are you 100% sure you want to make that statement?
Using just the web, if we listened to you we'd have no HTTPS, no SFTP, etc... Heck, we'd have no internet as we know it.
I appreciate that you have an opinion, but I'm gonna listen to the people who are doing the work.
CaffeineAddict
Well-Known Member
I wasted some 2 years learning PowerShell because it was presented to me from MS as modern and cool language for Windows administration.
Then later after some time figured out it was in vain because I was willing to get into game development and figured out I'd better spent that time learn python as scripting language because scripting in essential in game dev.
python can do everything PowerShell can plus much much more, it's fits into every scripting purpose you can imagine, is used in game dev and it's cross platform and it's very popular.
What a royal waste of time learning MS bloatware language that now I can't make any use of since I'm on Linux.
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On another side, I also learned C++ (on Windows), this one however was a super good shot because never encountered any limitations.
I can use it on Linux and I can use it to contribute to games and for what ever I want.
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The point is that some languages are simply not worth it due to limitations.
Rust? who uses rust and what can I do with rust?
I don't know rust but I'm pretty sure the language is not versatile to fit all programming roles so why bother learning it.
Linus has good reasons not to agree with non universal languages.
I admire only those languages that are universal. not because you can do what you want but also because you won't waste your time learning something only to later figure out you need to learn yet another language only to solve a specific task that only some specific language can solve.
CaffeineAddict
Well-Known Member
Web is different because there is server side and client side, and there is also database programming and what not.
Each of these parts require specific language, like PHP, javascript and SQL. there is no universal web language!
This is not the case with desktop development, where 1 language can fit all roles, from as low as driver development to as high as game dev.
You can do everything in C for desktop programs, but you can't do everything in javascript or what ever web language for a web page.
OP
Umm... The Linux kernel? You know, the kernel to the OS you're using. Quite a bit of it is in Rust and has been for a while.
LOL Imagine if your thinking was applied to something like the scientific method.
I'll use the term 'luditte' endearingly. We move to better when it's better. We try new things because they might be better. If they're not, we resume what we knew before. It's this sort of thinking that has made the modern world go around. Including, well, understanding that we go around the Sun and not the other way around.
CaffeineAddict
Well-Known Member
There is truth in that, but I'm referring mostly to native languages vs managed languages. (something I very much dislike)
managed language is that which does garbage collection, compiles to byte code and favors rapid development.
The opposite of managed language is native language, one where you have to manually handle memory, code compiles to machine code and the development process takes longer, there is no rapid development.
Benefit of managed language is rapid development at the expense of worse performance and library and design limitations, especially hardware access.
Benefit of native language is performance benefit, optimization and hardware access.
This are minimum comparisons.
Experienced devs will say, use the right tool for right purpose, but this is not applicable to solo devs who work alone as they'll have to spend considerable time (life long perhaps) learning and mastering more than 2-3 languages, so knowing and mastering universal general purpose language is the best option for them.
That's the point, it take time so why waste it.
OP
I'm pretty sure they're experienced. The kernel is one of the biggest software projects to ever exist. They've made the choice to use Rust (and still support C). I think they announced it around 2020 and we've been using Rust since version 6.1. (Don't quote me on those things, but those numbers will be close.) You can read the many reasons why they chose to do so. It's not like the choice was made by people who don't know what they're doing. The choice was made by people who have a collective number of years programming that's well into the hundreds. I think they're 'experienced devs'. They're certainly more experienced than I am.
