[sgonz]

Does anyone know how the Rust-Analyzer compares to the Rust Intellij plug-in? From the article it seems that Intellij uses their own custom solution.

I've been playing with Rust for the past couple of weeks, and I've really enjoyed the working with the language. The documentation and community are top-notch. The biggest downside from moving from a language like Java or Typescript (which I use in my day job) is the IDE experience. Things like code completion for other crates (which you'd take for granted in some of the other languages) don't seem to work.

[binarycrusader]

Personal Anecdote: Every time I've tried using rust-analyzer in another editor I've ended up going back to CLion (an IntelliJ-based IDE from JetBrains). The CLion experience is far superior in my personal experience. The speed difference is barely noticeable on my system while the completions, etc. are far more accurate with CLion. For example, with rust-analyzer on one of my projects, it sometimes suggests hundreds of possible completions for in a certain context whereas CLion (accurately) only suggests a handful. The integrated debugger support has been quite nice too.

[gizmondo]

I would say rust-analyzer has less features, but is more performant. For instance, RA works on rustc codebase, while intellij doesn't (the last time I checked).

[necubi]

I use CLion (same rust plugin as IntelliJ + debugging support) for rust development, and overall I would say the experience is pretty good. Certainly basic things like code completion from crates works; something is wrong with your setup if that's broken.

I've also seen huge improvements in the plugin over the past couple of years, such that most stuff just works now. Still some issues with macros (a hard problem in general, limited refactoring support, and occasional analysis failures, but I find it's a hugely productive environment.

(Also, as a bit of history, Aleksey Kladov who was the main developer on the intellij rust plugin went on to create rust-analyzer.)