How to think about `async`/`await` in Rust

Re:How to think about `async`/`await` in Rust by GolDDranks on Wednesday July 05, 2023 @05:24AM (#36597860)

The reason we left that paradigm in _Operating Systems_ is that OS's are supposed to be resilient. A single buggy app could easily freeze/crash the whole Windows 3.1 system, because the system has the naive assumption that all the apps are benevolent, bug-free, and happily co-operate with time-sharing. Try the same in Windows 2000; you can't, because the system is pre-emptive and forcibly ends the time slots of apps that don't yield. (And possibly kills the app; "MyApp isn't responding" etc.)

However, that same reason doesn't apply within a single app, because a single app by a single author _can_ safely co-operate with itself. So co-operative time sharing can work and make sense within single app.

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Re:How to think about `async`/`await` in Rust by dale_glass on Wednesday July 05, 2023 @08:41AM (#36599594)

> However, that same reason doesn't apply within a single app, because a single app by a single author _can_ safely co-operate with itself. So co-operative time sharing can work and make sense within single app.

That's not the case in any non-trivial app. Any real program truly has dozens if not hundreds of authors whose code you're using sight unseen, and which may be difficult to modify.

And your program getting stuck can be just as bad as the OS getting stuck. Suddenly your program doesn't reply to API requests, or doesn't relinquish some expensive resource (like an expensive VM), or some such.

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