If #git makes #Rust mandatory it will block future git versions to be ported to our niche platform. While this would not immediately lock us out of repos (the current version will likely continue to work fine some time) it eventually would complicate access (all git work would need to be circulated via some proxy setups or similar).
Needless to say I'm not thrilled by this idea.
I am not against Rust. I am against breaking change that leaves everyone not embracing Rust behind.
https://lore.kernel.org/git/20250904-b4-pks-rust-breaking-change-v1-0-3af1d25e0be9@pks.im/
@harrysintonen A platform that needs to run dev tools itself (rather than being a compilation target), but isn't supported by LLVM seems to be a niche of niches.
@kornel We of course employ cross-compiling. But still, being left out in that manner is still unfortunate, as we try to offer as complete and modern native SDK as possible.
I fully acknowledge that this is something we just have to live with. We are doing our own thing, and we can't possibly expect everyone else to cater for our platform quirks.
However, there are other platforms far from being this obscure that will be hit as well: Various legacy Debian platforms (alpha, hppa, m68k and sh4) and NonStop, AIX and Solaris come to mind at least. There are likely more.
@harrysintonen @kornel A couple of years back, there was a even proposal to change the m68k Linux ABI to cater for the internal limitations of Rust and LLVM that was ill equipped to deal with the requirements of this - admittedly, historic - architecture.
Being a compiler hacker myself, to me this meant: it is seriously immature, not ready for prime time. But for people pushing Rust, throwing away 4 decades of compatibility was completely justified, because fixing the world was more important.
@harrysintonen @kornel I think the problem was that it was a 32bit platform that had a less than 4 byte natural alignment - 2 byte in case of m68k - and this needed very deep changes to accommodate. But don't quote me on this. Maybe this was fixed since, no idea, I stopped caring.
We obviously do not speak the same languages nor share most values with these people. I tried to have an open mind, but the way it is pushed just makes me resent the whole thing. Maybe "I'm too old for this shit."
@chainq @harrysintonen @kornel I think the Rust problem will go away eventually, or we end up leaving anything it touches. When you tear down bridges to implement something by force it doesn't last very long.
@kornel I have developed some in Rust, it's good for certain things like end user applications, but not suitable for Git or coreutils in Ubuntu for example. If there are no performance benefits, why change something which works and has been battle tested for decades?
We are fully capable of handling several programming languages, there's no need for one language to fit all situations.
Sure, there are some benefits of future development regarding “memory safety”, but security wise you have already increased the attack surface significantly with the Cargo package manager system, supply chain attacks are on the rise.
@modrobert Rust is here to stay, sorry. There's no sign of it slowing or being displaced in the foreseeable future, especially not by anything old platforms already support.
I've ran Debian Potato on 68040. It was cool, but it's unfair for retro platforms to expect all future software to hold back and accommodate them forever. World has changed. There's lots more systems that need safe networking and reliable multicore than m68k boxes. Not enough devs to implement everything for everyone.