undefined | Better HN

0 pointszozbot2346y ago0 comments

> for instance initializing a structure or array partially if you're sure that nobody is going to use the initialized portion. Or having multiple mutable pointers/reference to the same object.

Rust supports MaybeUninit<> for the former example, and unsafe raw pointers for the latter. It needs unsafe because these patterns are not safe in the general case and absent an actual proof of correctness embedded in the source code, a static analysis pass can only deal with the general case.

0 comments

simias6y ago

That's my point though, in both cases the developer needs to add additional syntax to make the intent clear. "Naive" Rust code that tries to do that stuff is rejected by the compiler.

I've expressed myself poorly in my original comment and apparently it looks like I was criticizing Rust but I wasn't. I was just pointing out that safety didn't come "for free" by toggling a compiler flag, you have to change the way you code some things. If C and C++ were to become safe languages, code would need to be rewritten using things like MaybeUninit, split_at_mut, RefCell etc...

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

0 comments

simias6y ago

That's my point though, in both cases the developer needs to add additional syntax to make the intent clear. "Naive" Rust code that tries to do that stuff is rejected by the compiler.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse