Rust on Particle: call for contributors

Continuing the discussion from Will we one day see rust-lang support? :slight_smile::

Hey all! @mdma has built a small proof-of-concept for using Rust to do firmware development on Particle devices. While the implementation so far is very minimal, I think there's a big opportunity to build this out as a complete solution where Rust is an alternative to coding in "Arduino" (i.e. Wiring/C++/C).

Given that we're not Rust experts, we'd love to get help from the community pushing this forward. This would be a great opportunity to contribute to a new way of doing embedded software development and engage directly with the Particle team.

If you're interested in contributing to this project, let us know by responding to this thread! We'll send free Particle hardware to contributors, as well as give you a budget for buying hardware (shields, breakout board, etc.) to test from places like SparkFun and Adafruit. Plus you'll get to work closely with @mdma, which is a reward on its own :smile:

cc: @elite @francisdb @dbrgn @zachary @dave @BDub

P.S. We have to come up with an awesome name for this. What is a Particle of Rust? Iron Oxide? Flake? Fleck? Fe2O3?

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I like just FE2+Ion (pardon the lack of proper Scientific Notation). I’d be willing to test and contribute in any way I can. By no means a Developer by any common use of the word but I can usually find my way with a little guidance. If you have lots of people respond by all means start with them but I’m up for a challenge.

Another possible name is: ferroxyl, which is a solution used to detect the presence of Rust.

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I’d be interested in contributing. I’m not an expert in Rust, but I am a developer with some free time on my hands.

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Instead of iron(III) oxide, how about iron(III) chloride, aka Ferric. I’m familiar with it from using it in wastewater treatment plants, but I just found out it can also be used to etch PCBs.

I’d be happy to help. I’m not an expert on either Rust or embedded development, but I think I know enough to be able to contribute. And I’m willing to learn and maybe contribute some firmware code and libraries :smiley:

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I’d be very interested in contributing! I already have a Photon, and have actually been trying to get https://zinc.rs/ running on it as of yesterday when I saw that PR. No luck yet, although there’s lots of progress already!

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Yes definitely i would like to contribute to the development

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Great! We’ll follow up shortly with contributors individually to get you all some test hardware. The more the merrier, please keep it coming if you’d like to participate!

I would love to contribute. I have lots of experience with Arduino.

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Particle team & community:

I make a living as a software engineer and I would love to have the ability to use Rust for firmware development on Particle devices. I’m a big fan of the Rust language and have been crossing my fingers that the community will continue to grow. I am able to contribute some of my time to this if you would like more help from the community.

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I would love to participate!

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My Arduino/embedded experience is trivial at best but I’m very interested in the potential to use my Rust experience for projects in future!

I’d be happy to contribute to this where possible :slight_smile:

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I would very much like to contribute on this project! I’ve some ideas floating around that I want to implement, and this would be a fantastic pre-cursor to achieving them. Plus I’d love to help this out.

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I’d like to help! I have some experience in Rust and a few years experience in embedded development. I played around with https://zinc.rs a bit and would love to do more embedded work with Rust :smiley:

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I’d like to contribute as well. I’ve done some “bare metal” Rust programming on a STM32 discovery board in the past (disclaimer: outdated project, which I hope to update sometime soon).

I’d like to know if there’s some sort of roadmap or github issue discussing what wants to be accomplished. Is the goal a rustic API on top of the C HAL, or a pure rust HAL library, or perhaps porting other components to Rust?

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Very happy to contribute. I ma happier with hardware than firmware but have a weekly geek night with a professional developer friend and we are looking for a project.

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Just curious as to the timeline for people to get development boards?

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And just wondering - once the electrons are out, would it also be possible to get one of them?

So glad to see so many contributors! We’re gonna sit down internally next week to figure out how to manage all this, and we’ll make a plan to get Photons out next week. Also @dbrgn yes, happy to send Electrons once they’re available!

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+1 for Rust on Particle! I’m also interested in contributing.

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