Prossimo – Memory safety for the Internet's most critical infrastructure

Re:Prossimo – Memory safety for the Internet's most critical... by grumblenum on Saturday June 19, 2021 @11:02AM (#27561018)

Using a mode checker on existing software is unproductive, but rewriting existing, working software that you have to shoehorn into a shape rustc (which had a miscompilation bug until 1.52.1, has no specifications or alternative implementations, right?) will compile is productive? Rust’s type system is elegant, but Agda, OCaml F#, F* and Haskell, which are in a whole different league of sophistication, are not? Furthermore, I’m not aware of any progress in “sealed rust” or “rust belt” other than raising grant money. I don’t think a certification is coming anytime soon. There are other verified compilers that could be used now, though.

This argument sounds like rust for rust’s sake.

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Re:Prossimo – Memory safety for the Internet's most critical... by Ericson2314 on Saturday June 19, 2021 @11:09AM (#27561111)

> Using a mode checker on existing software is unproductive, but rewriting existing, working software that you have to shoehorn into a shape rustc .... will compile is productive?

The rewrite is a 1-time cost.

> Rust’s type system is elegant, but Agda, OCaml F#, F* and Haskell, which are in a whole different league of sophistication, are not?

I am primarily a Haskell user, and I already said I have nothing against GC. Those other languages (except for F#) are great!

> has no specifications or alternative implementations

That is a major downside (I work on GHC and wish it wasn't the only game in town) and affects all of those. That's why I put out SML and the CakeML implementation. SML lacks shiny new stuff but the grunt work has been done.

I would certainly use SML over any variant of C for anything that needs dynamic allocation.

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Re:Prossimo – Memory safety for the Internet's most critical... by steveklabnik on Saturday June 19, 2021 @11:20AM (#27561237)

> which had a miscompilation bug until 1.52.1,

All compilers have miscompilation bugs. Even ones that are proven correct.

> has no specifications or alternative implementations, right?

There is one alternative implementation that is good enough to bitwise reproduce rustc, there are a few other in-progress alternate implementations.

> I’m not aware of any progress in “sealed rust” or “rust belt”

That doesn't mean they haven't progressed. By the way, "Sealed Rust" is now called "Ferrocene" and is expected to GA in late 2022. https://ferrous-systems.com/ferrocene/

> There are other verified compilers that could be used now, though.

This is true, for sure. A compiler being verified is not a panacea.

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Re:Prossimo – Memory safety for the Internet's most critical... by grumblenum on Saturday June 19, 2021 @11:53AM (#27561558)

A verified compiler is not panacea, but rust is because of unsubstantiated claims of its marketing professionals? This is total nonsense.

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Re:Prossimo – Memory safety for the Internet's most critical... by steveklabnik on Saturday June 19, 2021 @11:54AM (#27561570)

Where did I say Rust is a panacea? A verified Rust compiler is a verified compiler, and wouldn’t be one either.

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Re:Prossimo – Memory safety for the Internet's most critical... by grumblenum on Sunday June 20, 2021 @10:06AM (#27570097)

The stated goal of the grant program is to rewrite stable software many people use in Rust with the implied context being that C can’t be trusted, but Rust can be. I’m surprised that a language with no specified guarantees is favored over well established methods of verification. When you poopoo formal methods and verified compilers, it’s very hard to find a coherent logic behind RIIR, which offers much less in terms of security.

Unless the exercise is a pretext to rationalize the grant money (which would be the real purpose).

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Re:Prossimo – Memory safety for the Internet's most critical... by howinteresting on Monday June 21, 2021 @10:06AM (#27579281)

The formal verification researchers I've worked with love Rust, because its type system nails the basics so they can focus on proving more interesting properties.

Rust and formal verification work really well together. You can formally verify properties in a small section of critical code, then use the type and lifetime systems to expand those properties to the whole codebase. It's not an either/or, it's a both/and.

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Re:Prossimo – Memory safety for the Internet's most critical... by grumblenum on Tuesday June 22, 2021 @07:57AM (#27590571)

That's fascinating. Can you direct me to any of their papers or public work formally verifying a rust codebase? I haven't seen that before.

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