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Rust, the software that arose to solve a domestic problem

The great inventions or the great solutions of the world appear when we least expect them. From unlikely situations arise the best advances that can solve our lives. Technology and computing are no strangers to this natural fact, if not ask Graydon Hoare with Rust. Do you know what he did?

Rust is one of the programming languages that are most used when working with popular cryptocurrencies and creating nodes to mine cryptoactives. In 2022, Rust became the third most widely used programming language on Linyx, after C and Assembler.

The Elevator by Graydon Hoare and Rust

Graydon Hoare, was 29 years old and was computer programmer for Mozilla in 2006. One day when he was returning to his home located in Vancouver, he encountered the common problem that the elevator in his building had stopped working, and to make matters worse, it was not the first time it had happened. As the sources tell us, the situation tired this young computer scientist who decided that this should not happen again.

The situation was not for less, and it is that Graydon lived on a floor number 21 so while he went up the stairs quite furious he came to the thought that since he was a computer scientist he could not build an elevator that works smoothly some. And like everything in life, the idea crossed his mind before the matter he had in his house.

The computer programmer knew that the elevator software had crashed and was aware that those types of crashes were due to problems with the way a program uses memory. Hoare knew perfectly well that the software located on these devices was in C++ or type C language, highly demanded for its fast execution and how compact they are.

But not all that glitters is gold, and the young computer scientist knew that these types of software were prone to memory-based crashes and that these errors would cause a crash, like the one that had just happened to his elevator.

When Hoare finally arrived at his apartment on the 21st floor, far from looking angry and tired, he picked up his laptop and began working on a new design, a computer language never created before and which he hoped would not give memory problems. He named it Rust in honor of mushrooms and their ability to survive above all circumstances.

Mozilla sponsorship

Faced with such a discovery by his young employee, the company popular for its Firefox browser decided to sponsor Hoare’s project. in 2009making the official announcement a year later, in 2010. Mozilla was willing to push it forward by paying engineers to contribute to its development, such that for ten years, Mozilla worked tirelessly for Rust to become the potential it is today.

The depth was such that Patrick Walton, one of the engineers who worked on the project, recalls that “everyone really felt like they were working on something that could be really big.” Its spread was so noticeable that by early 2010 Rust was attracting volunteers from all over the world.

The first numbered pre-alpha version didn’t arrive until 2012 and it was not until 2015 when the first stable version was published. The team intended to release an official version of Rust, one that would be trusted by the companies that used it. But the programming continued to give problems due to the tireless work of its engineers.

would be in 2016 when all the work of Mozilla began to flourish. The company launched Servo, a search engine that had been created with Rus. From then on its usefulness was immediate and the following year Rust was used to rewrite the part of Firefox that represented CSS, giving the browser better performance.

Despite the obstacles in the way, Mozilla had a vision of the future and that is that, in the twentieth edition of Developer Economics, the Rust programming language stood out, despite being still unknown. Such is its immediate impact that powerful companies such as Facebook or Microsoft have already shown interest in Hoare’s program.

What advantages does Rust have?

For such a depth of success, Graydon Hoare’s programming offers advantages that different technology companies have already visualized. We tell you now so that you too are aware of them.

Easy and secure interoperability with C++

The use of C++ codes necessary to communicate with back-end systems is very common, so it is necessary that developers can use these libraries safely without sacrificing the benefits of Rust.

Ensures memory management

Rust is capable of ensure memory security. The usual thing was that if a memory became full it would cause a system error that would cause everything unnecessary to be deleted from memory. The consequence was the slowdown of the code. With Rust this does not happen.

High speed and high level languages

The Rust programming language guarantees a high speed without forgetting the efficient security that does not affect performance. The absence of the garbage collector allows Rust to program abstractly without slowing down its performance.

Easy to use

Its maximum advantage and exponent is the ease in its application. Both professionals and programmers with less knowledge can learn to use Rust.

What the young engineer Graydon Hoare casually created has reached our days permanently and everything seems to indicate that Rust will be the nerve center of Mozillaand it is that within the most important companies that already use this programming language are Amazon, Microsoft, Meta and Google.

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