0a017e5b95
This PR attempts to rework the lifetimes section to better contextualize how lifetimes are used and to try to lead through a series of examples more naturally. I think the current version of the lifetimes section falls short in a handful of ways that make it hard to teach in class. For a long time I've been experimenting with different ways to discuss the topic, and in my recent classes I think I've finally hit on an approach that works. The changes in this PR capture the approach I've been using. The core idea is to contextualize lifetime annotations by looking at what happens when we return a reference from a function. We start with a simple example that doesn't return a reference to show that the borrow ends when the function returns. Then we look at a function that returns a reference and show that it extends the borrow that was passed into the function. With that context, we then look at cases where we need lifetime annotations, specifically examples where there are two ref arguments and a returned ref. We look at both possible cases: A function where either of the argument refs may be returned, and a case where only one will be returned. In both cases we show how we use lifetime annotations to tell the compiler what the returned ref is borrowing. I haven't had a chance to use these slides in class yet so I'm putting this up as a draft PR while I continue to iterate on it so that other folks can start giving feedback.
Comprehensive Rust 🦀
This repository has the source code for Comprehensive Rust 🦀, a multi-day Rust course developed by the Android team. The course covers all aspects of Rust, from basic syntax to generics and error handling. It also includes deep dives on Android, Chromium, bare-metal, and concurrency.
Read the course at https://google.github.io/comprehensive-rust/.
Course Format and Target Audience
The course is used internally at Google to teach Rust to experienced software engineers, typically with a background in C++ or Java.
The course is taught in a classroom setting, and we hope it will be useful for others who want to teach Rust to their team. The course is less ideal for self-study, since you would miss out on classroom discussions. You would not see the questions and answers, nor the compiler errors we trigger when going through the code samples. We hope to improve the self-study experience via speaker notes and by publishing videos.
Press
Articles and blog posts from around the web which cover Comprehensive Rust:
- 2023-09-08: Teaching Rust in 5 days. Comprehensive Rust was used as a base for a 5-day university class on Rust.
- 2023-09-21: Scaling Rust Adoption Through Training. We published a blog post with details on the development of the course.
- 2023-10-02: In Search of Rust Developers, Companies Turn to In-House Training. About how Microsoft, Google, and others are training people in Rust.
- 2024-10-18: Rust Training at Scale | Rust Global @ RustConf 2024. What Google learned from teaching Comprehensive Rust for more than two years.
Setup
The course is built using a few tools:
- mdbook
- mdbook-svgbob
- mdbook-i18n-helpers and i18n-report
- mdbook-exerciser
- mdbook-course
- mdbook-linkcheck2
First, install Rust by following the instructions on https://rustup.rs/. Then clone this repository:
git clone https://github.com/google/comprehensive-rust/
cd comprehensive-rust
Then run the following command to install the correct versions of all tools mentioned above:
cargo xtask install-tools
This uses cargo install to install the tools, so you will find them in your
~/.cargo/bin/ directory afterwards.
Commands
Here are some of the commonly used commands you can run in the project. Run
cargo xtask to view all available commands.
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
cargo xtask install-tools |
Install all the tools the project depends on. |
cargo xtask serve |
Start a web server with the course. You'll find the content on http://localhost:3000. To serve any of the translated versions of the course, add the language flag (--language or -l) followed by xx, where xx is the ISO 639 language code (e.g. cargo xtask serve -l da for the Danish translation). |
cargo xtask rust-tests |
Test the included Rust snippets. |
cargo xtask web-tests |
Run the web driver tests in the tests directory. |
cargo xtask build |
Create a static version of the course in the book/ directory. Note that you have to separately build and zip exercises and add them to book/html. To build any of the translated versions of the course, add the language flag (--language or -l) followed by xx, where xx is the ISO 639 language code (e.g. cargo xtask build -l da for the Danish translation). TRANSLATIONS.md contains further instructions. |
Note
On Windows, you need to enable symlinks (
git config --global core.symlinks true) and Developer Mode.
Contributing
We welcome contributions. Please see CONTRIBUTING.md for details.
Contact
For questions or comments, please contact Martin Geisler or start a discussion on GitHub. We would love to hear from you.