command-line-rust VS too-many-lists

You absolutely must write programs, preferably using tests to ensure you are creating correct and reproducible code. May I suggest starting with my book, Command-Line Rust (O'Reilly, 2022). All the code/data/tests are in https://github.com/kyclark/command-line-rust Note that there are branches showing how to use the 4.x version of clap (command-line argument parser) rather than the 2.33 that was current when the book was published.

I think the best way to start learning a programming language is to write lots of small programs that you probably already know. Rust is a perfect command-line language, so I think it makes sense to start by implementing simple programs like "head" and "grep." I also think one should always learn to write and run tests, so I present my GitHub repo of inputs and tests you might like to use to write 14 such standard Unix command-line utilities: https://github.com/kyclark/command-line-rust If you want guidance on the language, I wrote a book called Command-Line Rust (O'Reilly, 2022) that explains all this code. One caveat is that the "clap" (command-line argument parser) module was at 2.33 when I published but is now v4, so you should look at the appropriate branches for versions of the programs that use the "builder" and "derive" patterns for that module. Or just use any old command-line parser you like as there's no requirement to use "clap." Best of luck to you!

You must write programs in a language in order to learn it. I also firmly believe that learning how to write and run tests is critical to learning any language. I wrote Command-Line Rust (O'Reilly, 2022) for the beginner (in Rust, at least) and with a focus on writing and testing small programs from very simple "Hello, world!" and getting increasingly more complex. You can look at https://github.com/kyclark/command-line-rust for the code/inputs/tests. Best of luck!

Code for the above book

I'm the author of Command-Line Rust (O'Reilly, 2022), which I wrote to introduce the language slowly to beginners by writing and testing short, focused programs. You can look over the code/tests/data at https://github.com/kyclark/command-line-rust. Note that there are branches that show the same programs using a more recent version of the "clap" crate.

I wrote Command-Line Rust (O'Reilly, 2022) to guide beginners in the language. You are challenged to write small functions and programs using tests to verify that everything is correct. You can look over the code and tests at https://github.com/kyclark/command-line-rust. Best of luck in your journey!

Here are the example programs from my book, Command-Line Rust (O'Reilly, 2022), along with the input files and tests: https://github.com/kyclark/command-line-rust

I like to suggest that students write programs they already know (or at least understand). For instance, you probably understand that head shows the first few lines of a text file, and you probably can already implement some version of that in one or two languages you know. Try that in Rust. I wrote 14 BSD/GNU command-line utilities in Rust for learning purposes. I wouldn't consider these high-performance/production programs as they are tailored to learning the language. I also stress how to test programs, so there are tests and inputs you can use to verify your programs match the output of the original programs (or you can modify these to suit your own tastes for how you would like them to work). https://github.com/kyclark/command-line-rust

Here are some more examples you may or may not find useful: https://github.com/kyclark/command-line-rust I tend to have a main() that calls a library's run() function that returns a Result and then exit with a nonzero code and error message on a failure.

You seem to have a preset opinion, and I'm not sure you are interested in re-evaluating it. So this is not written to change your mind.

I've developed production code in C, C++, Rust, and several other languages. And while like pretty much everything, there are situations where it's not a good fit, I find that the solutions tend to be the most robust and require the least post release debugging in Rust. That's my personal experience. It's not hard data. And yes occasionally it's annoying to please the compiler, and if there were no trait constraints or borrow rules, those instances would be easier. But way more often in my experience the compiler complained because my initial solution had problems I didn't realize before. So for me, these situations have been about going from building it the way I wanted to -> compiler tells me I didn't consider an edge case -> changing the implementation and or design to account for that edge case. Also using one example, where is Rust is notoriously hard and or un-ergonomic to use, and dismissing the entire language seems premature to me. For those that insist on learning Rust by implementing a linked list there is https://rust-unofficial.github.io/too-many-lists/.

Advent of Code was okay until I encounterd a problem that required a graph, tree or linked list to solve, where I hit a wall. Most coding exercises are similar--those requiring arrays and hashmaps and sets are okay, but complex data structures are a PITA. (There is an online course dedicated to linked lists in Rust but I couldn't grok it either). IMO you should simply skip problems that you can't solve with your current knowledge level and move on.

I feel obligated to point to the original cannon literature: https://rust-unofficial.github.io/too-many-lists/

I started learning Rust and like how the compiler is fussy about things. My plan was to implement the data structures I knew, but I got stuck at the singly linked list's remove() method. I've read the book as well, but I have no clue how to simplify this further:

My impression from the article is that Zig provides several different hashtables and not all of them are broken in this way.

This reminds me of Aria's comment in her Rust tutorial https://rust-unofficial.github.io/too-many-lists/ about failing to kill LinkedList. One philosophy (and the one Rust chose) for a stdlib is that this is only where things should live when they're so commonly needed that essentially everybody needs them either directly or to talk about. So, HashTable is needed by so much otherwise unrelated software that qualifies, BloomFilter, while it's real useful for some people, not so much. Aria cleaned out Rust's set of standard library containers before Rust 1.0, trying to keep only those most people would need. LinkedList isn't a good general purpose data structure, but, it was too popular and Aria was not able to remove it.

Having multiple hash tables feels like a win (they're optimized for different purposes) but may cost too much in terms of the necessary testing to ensure they all hit the quality you want.

> Cyclic references can be dealt with runtime safety checks too - like Rc and Weak.

Indeed. Starting out with code sprinkled with Rc, Weak, RefCell, etc is perfectly fine and performance will probably not be worse than in any other safe languages. And if you do this, Rust is pretty close to those languages in ease of use for what are otherwise complex topics in Rust.

A good reference for different approaches is Learn Rust With Entirely Too Many Linked Lists https://rust-unofficial.github.io/too-many-lists/

Second, once you've finished something introductory like The Book, read Learning Rust With Entirely Too Many Linked Lists. It really helped me to understand what ownership and borrowing actually mean in practical terms. If you don't mind paying for learning materials, a lot of people recommend Programming Rust, Second Edition by Blandy, Orendorff, and Tindall as either a complement, follow-up, or alternative to The Book.

Learning Rust With Entirely Too Many Linked Lists which highlights a lot of the differences with how you need to structure your code in Rust compared to other languages.