Developers are talking about Google’s latest creation: Carbon, a supposed wunderkind programming language that will save the technoverse from C++ and serve as its successor or replacement. Just like a rehashed Hollywood blockbuster about a supposed messiah, we’ve heard this story before. The 2000s saw more than one language try to fix C++’s minuses. The two big ones were Rust (backed by Mozilla) and Go (a.k.a. Golang, initiated by Google).

Rust and Go in some ways are polar opposites. They are defined by their respective approaches to code. Rust is scrupulous, meticulous, and demands painful attention to detail; Go is laidback by contrast, easygoing, and simple. They both prize efficiency, but one in the means (Go) and the other in the ends (Rust). A true Go vs. Rust battle needs to compare the two languages in more depth. Golang and Rust owe their births to loathing for other systems languages (and by languages, I mainly mean C++).