Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by z92 2618 days ago
shouldn't rust being faster than C be something of a red flag that they aren't quite the same algorithm? Or that the algorithm is sub-optimal?

The difference isn't much. And Rust is more like FORTRAN. Maybe a bit faster than C, but can't do the gymnastics with pointers that C can.
2 comments
oconnor663 2618 days ago
> can't do the gymnastics with pointers that C can

It can if you write the "unsafe" keyword, but there's a pretty strong community norm around not doing that sort of thing, unless you can encapsulate it inside some sort of safe API. And to be fair to C, I think C can close the gap with Rust/Fortran if you use the "restrict" keyword a lot?

link
steveklabnik 2618 days ago
With unsafe, you can do anything that C can.

Without unsafe, there’s significantly more aliasing information, which helps optimizations.

link