Boom or Bust, 50 Days to Colorado Gold Rust: Day 0
It was about two years ago when I first heard the name Rust mentioned. It was late summer or early fall, and I had just started my second internship as a software engineer. I had just finished a numerical analysis course at The University of Colorado Denver (my alma mater). The professor had been impressed enough with the work I had done that he had invited me to come work with him.
The company was a small government intelligence contracting firm specializing primarily in Digital Signal Processing and other forms of embedded systems work. Many of the engineers came from, an electrical engineering, or mathematics backgrounds, and almost none of them considered themselves to be software engineers. On one of my very first days, the topic of everyone’s favorite programming languages had come up. One of my coworkers, being an embedded systems engineer turned web developer, came up with the now unsurprising answer of Rust.
At the time, I had never heard of Rust and was too busy being astounded by the fact that I had my own office. I couldn’t be bothered to give a second thought to Rust. It wasn’t until a few years later at that same job that I would hear the name Rust again. I was working as a JavaScript developer, developing an early prototype of what one day would become a satellite mission management system. In the process of working as a modern front end developer, you invariably at some point bump into WebAssembly and with it are frequently introduced to Rust. This brief interaction, however, with still only enough inspiration to lead to an hour of Googling before I moved on.
A Journey Begins
It wasn’t until another year later when a good friend of mine who had introduced me to the world of functional programming and Haskell would mention Rust. They talked about all the pleasant experiences that they had surrounding Rust. They referred to the delightful experience of a supportive community and friendly Developers, and a programming language carrying refreshing features, and speed that is comparable to that of C++. So when they told me that they would be hosting Colorado Gold Rust this year, I knew it was time for me to pick up and learn a new language. So now I present to you “Boom or Bust, 50 days to Colorado Gold Rust”, my journey learning Rust in the 50 days leading up to Colorado Gold Rust. This series of articles is my attempt to not to show up to Colorado Gold Rust knowing nothing at all. Hopefully, I’ll also be able to walk away, having learned something valuable.
Request For Comment
This series of articles is also my first foray into writing articles and tech pieces. So please feel free to provide feedback and point out anything I may have overlooked or areas for improvement, whether it be in code or writing.
If you want to continue reading along here’s the next article in the series https://medium.com/@shawnbachlet/boom-or-bust-50-days-to-colorado-gold-rust-day-1-286898dd1dd6.