Learning and teaching Rust has been a big part of me in the last couple of years. Interest in the Rust programming language has brought me to found the Rust Linz meetup with Rainer Stropek, to teach Rust at the local university, and to do a ton of workshops on the topic. It’s a lot of fun! It has introduced me to one of the most welcoming communities. And I love seeing Rust code getting in production and keeping all the promises it gives us. Folks who I’m in contact with through various channels ask me how to best get started with Rust. This article tries to give you an overview.
The big problem with an article like this is that there is no definitive answer. Everybody learns differently. Some watch videos, some read books, others need tutorials. So instead of giving you a learning path, let me give you an overview of great resources that might help you get started!
I learned a lot about Rust by using Exercism. It’s an interactive platform that guides you through various Rust concepts through actual examples. You solve arbitrary programming tasks – Programming 101 if you will – that you might already know how to solve in other languages, so you can focus on implementing and learning the language rather than on finding the right algorithm. Tests give you feedback on your solution, and you’re able to consult a trainer or the community for other solutions. Seeing the solutions by others also helps improve yours and maybe find new techniques along the way.
How many books are there on Rust? The answer is: yes. No seriously, every major tech publisher has multiple different takes on Rust. The Rust community and working groups publish online books on certain topics like the Rustonomicon for unsafe Rust, the book on async Rust, or the unofficial book on Rust design patterns. Sharing info on Rust is a common thing in the community, which is great!
There are a couple of introductory books that are floating around, aimed for different styles of learning and released by different publishers.
There are so much more. Please look out for Rust books that might be tailored to a specific use-case that’s just up your alley, like Herbert’s “Hands-on Rust” that teaches through game development, or Luca’s “Zero to Production in Rust” that helps you deploy web APIs written in Rust.
One of my most favorite videos is “Hack without fear” by Niko Matsakis. It gives you a really good overview of some of the most important topics and concepts without overwhelming you with syntax. Here, you learn ownership. You get the most important principles presented in the most digestible way.
I usually don’t do video courses, but I found Udemy’s Ultimate Rust Crash Course by Nathan Stocks valuable and approachable. Again for the same reasons: Introducing you to concepts and the language fundamentals in a very focussed way, without overwhelming you too much. The course runs for less than 3 hours, which is super short given how vast the programming language is. Still, you manage to gather a lot of information and see some actual examples!
I also invite you to watch the entirety of recordings for the Rust Linz meetup. We started 1.5 years ago with a special focus on newcomers, so you find some great introductory talks on Cargo, iterators, traits, debugging, paired with a lot of applied use-cases. One of our most-watched videos is “Learning how to learn Rust” by Tim McNamara (again!), which you might enjoy as well!
While being influenced a lot by its precursors, Rust works differently than many other programming languages. Especially if you come from an OOP background and did mostly Java or C# in the past, you might find it hard to adapt to new patterns and leave out old ones that you acquired over the years. I could write at length on things that might not be useful while learning Rust, but I’d rather refer to the following resources
And that’s how I would get started learning Rust. I’d like to improve and extend the list over time. If you found a great resource that you think should be on this list, let me know!
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