Explain what Rust actually is on the landing page

Content Feature Request

Summary

Explain what Rust is on the landing page -- a programming language.

Motivation

On the landing page, a lot of time is spent praising Rust, yet at no point (if you don't count Chucklefish testimony) is it explained what Rust actually is. Without clearly communicating what Rust is, it's confusing and not useful to a person who might be first visiting the website without prior knowledge.

Drawbacks

None that I can see. I have yet to visit a PL website that doesn't have "programming language" on the landing page.

[tshepang]

Is it a likely thing to end up on the page without knowing in advance you are visiting a site of a programming language?

[eddyp]

I don't think is relevant if it's likely or not. The page should make it clear this is a programming language, not some framework or some other thing.

[Zaechus]

Well, the title of the page is "Rust programming language" and the website URL has "rust-lang" in it. The rest of the page also presents multiple references to Rust being used for programming as a language and not a framework or other tool.

[bjadamson]

Is it a likely thing to end up on the page without knowing in advance you are visiting a site of a programming language?

Yes. Think about non-power users landing here, because they are doing research for teammates.

A contrived example, think about the 12yr old kid who plays the Rust game, but accidentally lands on the rust programming language page. Maybe they would develop an interest in Rust, and thus programming, because their favorite game has the same name.

[jdahlstrom]

Well, the title of the page is "Rust programming language" and the website URL has "rust-lang" in it. The rest of the page also presents multiple references to Rust being used for programming as a language and not a framework or other tool.

Titles are useless – nobody even sees them in modern browsers without contortions. It's easy to forget or not realize that they even exist, and most people probably do. Having to rely on the URL for critical information is not exactly great UX either. And the existence of URLs in the first place, as well, is getting more and more irrelevant and invisible, a mere technical detail. And having to scan through the whole page and piece together little bits of information, just in order to figure out what your site is about, is about as user-hostile as it gets!

[aidanhs]

Putting myself in the shoes of a non-technical person (often decisionmakers for using Rust) who may have heard about Rust from their team, I could see it taking little while for it to sink in that it's a programming language. I can sympathise with this suggestion.

[ashleygwilliams]

i also agree and advocated for maintaining the words "programming language". this is fundamentally something that @aturon has taken lead on so we should wait for his comment on how to proceed.

[sanxiyn]

Any update?

[yoshuawuyts]

@sanxiyn Sorry for the lack of updates!

Between Rust 2018, the holidays and the rust all-hands most people working on this have been a bit busy. There's been talk about forming a Rust Website team; hopefully there should be more bandwidth to explore copy changes once that ball gets rolling.

[sanxiyn]

Any update? Rust landing page still does not tell what Rust is.

[yoshuawuyts]

@sanxiyn getting the ball rolling again has been taking a bit longer than I'd hoped for. I don't have an ETA, but am confident we'll get there eventually (:

[JakeTherston]

For other people in my position, I recommend directing curious colleagues to Wikipedia's entry on Rust until rust developers get around to fixing their landing page. The Wikipedia entry

• What it is
• What its strong points are
• What its syntax is like
• Examples

I'm perplexed from the fact that a simple issue like this has remained open for half a year without resolution. How is this current state of the landing page even considered acceptable? If I submit a pull request changing the the phrase:

"Empowering everyone to build reliable and efficient software."

to

"A programming language that empowers everyone to build reliable and efficient software."

Will it be accepted?