Rust Engineers Hiring for Custom Applications

Oct 3, 2023 Reading time : 5 min

Rust is the talk of the town today. It emerged as a secure and functional language borrowing a bit from many other programming languages and addressing their challenges, conquering the hearts of business people and developers. Its today’s popularity is also explained by its wide application in blockchain and FinTech development.

Rust entered the programming arena in 2006 as the brainchild of Graydon Hoare, a Mozilla developer and researcher targeting the widespread gaps and inefficiencies in the coding logic. Since its release, Rust was successfully used in many grand digital projects, like Coursera, Dropbox, Atlassian, and the like.

Rust shares many similarities with C++, but it’s better than its counterpart in many senses. First, its syntax is much simpler and user-friendlier than that of C++, and its approach to memory management is way more efficient. Other pluses cover better concurrency, zero-cost abstractions, and superior parallelism of the Rust code.

So, Rust is the future of coding, and sooner or later, you might feel that you need to get a Rust specialist to the team. Still, hiring Rust engineer candidates is a challenge today, given the shortage of competent professionals and booming demand for the Rust workforce. Here is a quick intro to Rust programming specifics, skills your ideal Rust coder should possess, and the recruitment peculiarities.

Benefits of Rust for Your Project

If finding a great Rust specialist is a challenge, why do you need to mess up with Rust overall? The answer is pretty simple; Rust offers numerous advantages over other existing programming approaches. You’re sure to see quick gains from using Rust in your next project, such as:

Abstractions are free.
Concurrency is a built-in feature of Rust.
The code is very secure and reliable.
Rust programming has extensive, informative, and top-quality documentation.
Rust is on the rise globally, attracting more talented coders to the industry.
Rust removes memory errors and concurrent programming limitations from the process.
There is a strong emphasis on memory safety and optimal memory management.
References have a lifetime in Rust, which helps avoid the invalidity problem characteristic of C and C++.

What to Look for in a Rust Coder?

As you can see, Rust offers a set of unique features and benefits that contribute to superior digital products. However, the pressing challenge with Rust is its quickly growing popularity, which creates a shortage of specialists in the labor market. Besides, developers who only start out with Rust often deliver mediocre services. So, when hiring a Rust specialist for your team, you need to make sure that they are the right fit for the job and possess all the required competencies.

Here are the key criteria to check out when considering a new Rust developer:

Professional memory management.
Knowledge of C++, Java, Python, and Go.
Experience with Cargo and WebAssembly use.
Strong analytical skills.
Logical thinking and an ability to break down the problem into smaller increments, translating them into code.
Troubleshooting and error detection in real-time.
Predictive thinking.
A college/university degree in Computer Science or Engineering.

Interview Questions for Rust Development Candidates

As soon as you screen the available resumes and pick several candidates for further consideration, it’s time to conduct a personal or online interview. During a job interview, you should check the coders:

Basic understanding of Rust syntax for major design elements (arrays, strings, loops, and conditionals).
Knowledge of Rust enums and functions.
Awareness of secure coding practices.
Mastery of object-oriented programming principles and immutability essentials.
Understanding of memory allocation principles in Rust.
Competence in data structures and integer sizes.
Understanding of stack vs. heap memory allocation principles.
Knowledge of Cargo.

Some informative questions to ask during the interview are:

What features are unique to Rust and not available in other programming languages?
What types of digital projects can benefit from Rust?
In what conditions would you prefer Rust over C++ and vice versa?
What do you know about Cargo, and how do you use it during Rust code production?
Do you consider Rust a safer alternative to C and C++? If yes, in which aspects?
Can you build an operating system exclusively on Rust?
Which debugging methods do you use? Which one do you consider the most efficient?

Pick Rust, Invest in the Future

As our review suggests, the future is cloudless for Rust, which is chosen as a default programming choice by more companies every day. The 2020 decision of Linux to create its new kernel code in Rust also shows how pervasive its impact is on the programming industry. Thus, you can never go wrong by choosing Rust as your programming choice.

With these tips in mind, you will find a suitable Rust developer much quicker. Always consider the coders’ portfolio and references, as the skillset and training in a resume may be only a theoretical background without practical expertise. Thus, a reality check during an interview and a simple coding task in real-time can give you a much better idea of the considered candidates’ professionalism.