Ultra portability. And there shouldn't be any startup scripts, however, the binary does need to be compiled for the target platform.

I'm pretty sure the use case of this is more akin to an electron replacement, and not a production web server. So the user would just download and run the binary, and interact with the app from their browser.

I don't see point of this either. I aware this would cost me lot of hardly obtained karma, but I feel I have to say this.

Strange how some people are obsessed with hype. I think what raised interest of this article was just word "Rust" in the title. Rust seems to be wet dream of many developers. They heard it's safe, so it will magically solve all their problems. But the usage of Rust in this case is meaningless. You could do the same with python, nodejs, java, just plain nginx or million other (and better) ways. Just first google query returned probably better solution if you like single static binary http://miniweb.sourceforge.net/. It would be two files instead of one miniweb binary and static site compressed as 7z.

How does this thing scale? What about SSL? Do I have to put reverse SSL terminating proxy in front of it? Yes, you say? Ok, why not just use that proxy for serving those static files too (nginx does that) and skip this thing completely. What about performance? Have you tried to httperf on it?

I would appreciate if this did more then just being a single binary. Like Facebook's HipHop compiler of PHP to static executable or something like that. Sorry but this is real bullshit.

You're bashing it based on some assumption that it's being heralded as an amazing piece of tech. It's just a static binary. If you want to argue the merit of static binaries then, by all means. I personally love them, it's one of the reasons why I like Go so much. I'm sure there's a ton of people who like static binaries, and who dislike them.

There's nothing else to see here, you either like dependency-less binaries or not.

Hell, if anything, I don't see the point of your point, calling static binaries "real bullshit". Depending on the scenario static binaries are either better for you, or worse for you - it's just a tool in a bag of tools. How can that possibly be bullshit? Is a wrench bullshit?

I understand that static bundled site as rust executable is not for me. However I'm asking for who is? Specially considering my concerns about about SSL, performance.

EDIT: I'm not against static binaries per se. Only against this usage of them.

I've actually used static bundles (including css/etc) for a lot of internal applications, both at home and at work.

Basically anywhere where reducing difficulty of deployment and asset management outweighs the valid concerns you pointed out. It's really, really handy in my view.

Of course, I've got no plans or desire to run some production documentation site on this. Yet, that problem domain is vastly different than internal tooling, OSS apps, etc.

Just think of a note web app you write. Do you want your users to have to manage css/template/image bundles just to use your note app? Why not just make the binary work with zero configuration/management? Plus, if you wanted - you can of course support both, allowing the user to override css files if they so desire, without having to recompile the binary/etc.

If theoretically had that need, I would first go with docker and if hw is limited, then maybe this thing I just googled out as part of research on the topic:

http://miniweb.sourceforge.net/. It would be two files. 20k server binary and 7z with site resources. It would safe me trouble of recompiling binary.

How about a web interface on an embedded device?

As widely used/loved as nginx seems to be, I couldn't for the life of me find any good resources that hand hold a bit more than just reading the docs and hoping for the best.

Know any good nginx books or courses?

Back in the day, Shopify distributed a standalone version of their store server so people could write themes. It was pretty neat. I could see this being used for something similar.

I agree with what you're saying in regards to simply using nginx to handle web requests. I don't agree that there needs to be a point to this to do it.

You're absolutely right, though I assume using Apache/nginx with a reverse proxy is pretty standard for this type of scenario. Having a single static binary makes it convenient for developing, testing, and deploying.