Rust 2021

2021 brings hope and a new edition. It isn't clear what should be in this edition, but I'd like to remove the cruft and maybe finally nail down modules and maybe have another look at error handling.

What about the rest of the year? To answer that, let's start looking at 2022. Rust in 2022 should be about growth. Not so much about developers using it, but rather getting CTOs and CIOs demanding that better tools (IE Rust) are used in their enterprise to reduce the risk in software. This requires strong evidence that Rust is better than the status quo and the "marketing" to back it up.

So how do we prepare in 2021 to get this growth?

Firstly, we need to fill the missing gaps with GAT and Constant Generics. While not needed in the vast majority of cases, if they are missing, there will be push back from developers (regardless if they are actually needed or not).

Rust tooling is already incredible.

There needs to be maturity in the ecosystem. I think 3 of the major perceptions that degrade this are the async families, name squatting and dependance test. All of these have loads of articles about them and while I am hopeful there is action in the background, if there isn't then 2021 should be used to break the back of the issues.

There needs to be a foundation. While the need at the moment is more around legal and funding, advocacy is an important part of getting Rust in the hands of enterprise. Of course, in the interests of fairness, they should be advocating for better software in general and not necessarily rewriting everything in Rust.

In the end, I want software that doesn't make me frustrated each and every day while being reliable. I want everyone to experience software that just works and doesn't crash or spill its secrets.