Biden administration calls for developers to embrace memory-safe programing languages and move away from those that cause buffer overflows and other memory access vulnerabilities.

White House urges developers to dump C and C++::Biden administration calls for developers to embrace memory-safe programing languages and move away from those that cause buffer overflows and other memory access vulnerabilities.

  • OutrageousUmpire@lemmy.worldEnglish
    79·
    10 months ago

    I’m not sure what to think about this. It’s bizarre, the White House making any recommendations on programming languages.

    They’re definitely not seen as an authority in this field. Why would anyone care what recommendation they make? And so why make one at all?

    • mox@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
      65·
      10 months ago

      They’re definitely not seen as an authority in this field. Why would anyone care what recommendation they make?

      It’s possible that they are acting on the advice of advisors who are authorities in this field.

      And so why make one at all?

      I expect it’s because information and industrial security are components of national security, which is of great concern to them, and those things depend on software.

      I’m not surprised to see this, given that state-sponsored electronic attacks are on the rise these days.

      • EatATaco@lemm.eeEnglish
        7·
        10 months ago

        This is exactly why people sound sophomoric when they say “lobbying needs to go!” There are some drastic problems with lobbying as it is allowed now, but the last thing we need is the government regulating things they know nothing about without the input of experts. On top of that, it’s nonsense that I can’t pass my local councilman on the street and stop and push them to spend more time addressing important issues like climate change.

        • mox@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
          11·
          10 months ago

          It’s important to remember that the argument against lobbying isn’t about the broadest sense of the word “lobbying”, but rather about corporations and other moneyed interests having unfair and unhealthy influence over the laws that govern everyone else.

          The people who decry lobbying probably agree with you; they’re just using the word in an implicitly narrow context.

          • EatATaco@lemm.eeEnglish
            2·
            10 months ago

            they’re just using the word in an implicitly narrow context.

            I think we mostly agree, but disagree on this point. I think it’s just that most people haven’t given it any thought. Like they are just ignorantly going along with the popular opinion.

            • mox@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
              2·
              10 months ago

              I suppose mob mentality is likely to play some part in every widely shared view.

              At the very least, I can guarantee that one of said people has given it thought. :)

        • porous_grey_matter@lemmy.mlEnglish
          3·
          10 months ago

          I don’t think your argument quite holds up. The directionality is important. It’s true that the government can’t always know about technical things directly, but I think it’s fine for the government to be expected to know which experts they need to consult, and for that process not to just be open to everyone (which just means more open to those with more money).

          • EatATaco@lemm.eeEnglish
            1·
            10 months ago

            it’s fine for the government to be expected to know which experts they need to consult

            What happens if they don’t even know it’s a problem? Or they don’t realize the severity of the problem so it gets a lower priority?

            And it also sounds like you’re arguing that I can’t talk to my local representative about what I think are the important issues that need to be addressed. If they have to seek me out, I would have zero input.

    • someacnt_@lemmy.worldEnglish
      11·
      10 months ago

      There have been words around this, like how software should be safe by design, but the regulation should come from the governing entity. This is simply materialized now, but there has been momentum.

    • AA5B@lemmy.worldEnglish
      4·
      10 months ago

      Damn, it’s been like 25 years since I touched either of those. Aside from OS development, do people really do that anymore?

      • ArmainAP@programming.devEnglish
        9·
        10 months ago

        C++ is also the standard in game dev. You may see some C# here and there, but most engines, public available or otherwise, are built on C++.

        If it is a AAA game, I can assure you it is most likely made with C++.

      • Subverb@lemmy.worldEnglish
        3·
        10 months ago

        Embedded systems developer here. If you’re programming on ARM or one of the other big microcontrollers there aren’t many well supported options. ARM’s official Keil compiler and libraries are C and C++ and I see no official movement to change that.

        They have literally decades in building those tools.

        Microsoft’s multithreaded OS ThreadX is C code. They just bought it for a large undisclosed amount in 2018. It ain’t going anywhere soon.

        AWS’s FreeRTOS is C. Not going anywhere.

        Embedded development toolchains are very slow to change.

      • flatpandisk@lemm.eeEnglish
        1·
        10 months ago

        A large chunk of not most of robotic development is C and C++. Since working with a mixture of hardware, software, and even performance software here comes C and C++.

  • omega_x3@lemmy.worldEnglish
    46·
    10 months ago

    Team Fortran raise up, but not too fast our old bones aren’t as strong as they used to be.

  • Imgonnatrythis@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    42·
    10 months ago

    I think we should politicize code. It seems so unfettered by politics so far while so many other things are nicely split amongst party lines. Seems like maybe the Republicans should embrace C and the democrats can have python or something.

    • mox@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
      23·
      10 months ago

      C isn’t bad. It has been a good portable assembly language for ages, and remains so today. What’s problematic is continuing to use it where more advanced languages now make more sense.

      I won’t defend C++, though. I’m happy to kick it to the curb now that better alternatives are gaining traction.

  • ben@lemmy.zipEnglish
    32·
    10 months ago

    Probably a good idea, plenty of languages out there that can give good performance while being memory safe nowadays.

    • hagelslager@feddit.nlEnglish
      7·
      10 months ago

      Such as? (Non-programmer here, so I don’t know the ins and outs of programming languages.)

      • ben@lemmy.zipEnglish
        12·
        10 months ago

        Zig and Rust come to mind, at least for replacements for low level languages.

        • scharf_2x40@lemmy.worldEnglish
          8·
          10 months ago

          Isn’t that only microsoft exclusive and closed source? Also does compiling it really yield the same speed as C, it is garbage collected isn’t it?

          • 𝒍𝒆𝒎𝒂𝒏𝒏@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
            9·
            10 months ago

            Was always possible to compile+run C# on Linux using the Mono project. Until Microsoft “bought them out” and created .NET Core, a cross platform version of .NET that MS now encourages people to use instead…

            Microsoft’s new linux compile tools rub me the wrong way slightly, with the telemetry that’s opt-in by default.

            Mono is still extremely valuable for older .NET Framework apps under WINE though, way easier to setup compared to the official installers from what i’ve experienced.

            No idea how compiled C# compares to C…

      • lolcatnip@reddthat.comEnglish
        2·
        10 months ago

        Rust is the main one for the kind of code that’s typically written in C++. Most memory-safe languages make big compromises on performance, but Rust code tends to run about as fast as comparable C++ code.

  • treadful@lemmy.zipEnglish
    10·
    10 months ago

    “We, as a nation, have the ability—and the responsibility—to reduce the attack surface in cyberspace and prevent entire classes of security bugs from entering the digital ecosystem but that means we need to tackle the hard problem of moving to memory safe programming languages,” National Cyber Director Harry Coker said in the White House news release.

    o7

  • Richard@lemmy.worldEnglish
    6·
    10 months ago

    C is not the problem, it’s sloppy “programmers” who cannot handle direct memory control and who do not understand the underlying system architecture and how a microprocessor operates. People who are good at writing C can make code just as safe as the safest Rust code.

    • dejected_warp_core@lemmy.worldEnglish
      10·
      10 months ago

      While this is technically correct, it’s tantamount to saying “just don’t make mistakes”, or arguing that a seatbelt is unnecessary because many are good enough drivers to not need it.

      Languages like C and C++ do not prohibit the kinds of mistakes that the NSA told us two years ago lead to software vulnerabilities.

      Other languages, like Rust, have higher guardrails built in and make it much more difficult to accidentally create the same failure modes.

    • wolf@lemmy.zipEnglish
      7·
      10 months ago

      I love C, but C definitely is the problem.

      While one disciplined programmer can in theory write correct code, once there is a small group of even good C programmers and a code base with more than around 3000-5000 LOC, there will be bugs. There is a good reason for tools like Valgrind etc.

      While I think C and C++ are the problem, I don’t think Rust is the solution, tho.

    • daddy32@lemmy.worldEnglish
      6·
      10 months ago

      It is just too easy to shoot yourself in the foot when using a foot gun… Sure the experts can avoid it, but that doesn’t mean the foot gun is a good tool in general.

    • lolcatnip@reddthat.comEnglish
      5·
      10 months ago

      Your take is objectively false. This issue has been studied and the conclusion every time is that real programmers make memory-related mistakes all the time. Even if there are a few superhuman programmers who never get tired, have a bad day, or misunderstand an API, firing the 99.99% of programmers who aren’t superheroes isn’t a realistic solution to anything.

    • CatLikeLemmingEnglish
      3·
      10 months ago

      If you’re an expert tightrope walker, you’re likely not gonna fall off. You can just do it without too much issue. When you’re doing it over a chasm, and you don’t plan on dying, you’d still probably prefer a harness though, wouldn’t you?

      Edit: I’m not saying C is a bad language or anything, but for important applications the safety of actually memory safe languages is vital for lower-skilled programmers and still a good assistance for higher-skilled programmers, as we’re all humans and it doesn’t hurt to try and avoid the mistakes we will eventually make.

      • lolcatnip@reddthat.comEnglish
        2·
        10 months ago

        I’ll say it. C is a bad language. There was a time when it needed needed to exist and using it was a smart choice, but it has outlived its usefulness for anything but legacy code and niche use cases like FFI. It’s in essentially the same category as Cobol.

          • lolcatnip@reddthat.comEnglish
            1·
            10 months ago

            It wasn’t bad at the time relative to what else was around.

            And I don’t even know what you’re getting at by saying “all” successor languages copied it. Are you referring to how many languages use curly braces as block delimiters? Because that’s not what’s wrong with C.