rust-lang/rust — pull request #19654 by aturon (2014-12-09 04:52:44+00:00)
Title: [WIP] Replace `std::task` with `std::thread`, remove librustrt, make final "runtime" features lazily initialize

WIP: this is not yet passing all tests, but I wanted to start getting initial reviewer feedback.

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This PR substantially narrows the notion of a "runtime" in Rust, and allows calling into Rust code directly without any setup or teardown.

After this PR, the basic "runtime support" in Rust will consist of:

* Unwinding and backtrace support
* Stack guards

Other support, such as helper threads for timers or the notion of a "current thread" are initialized automatically upon first use.

When using Rust in an embedded context, it should now be possible to call a Rust function directly as a C function with absolutely no setup, though in that case panics will cause the process to abort. In this regard, the C/Rust interface will look much like the C/C++ interface.

In more detail, this PR:

* Merges `librustrt` back into `std::rt`, undoing the facade. While doing so, it removes a substantial amount of redundant functionality (such as mutexes defined in the `rt` module). Code using `librustrt` can now call into `std::rt` to e.g. start executing Rust code with unwinding support.

* Allows all runtime data to be initialized lazily, including the "current thread", the "at_exit" infrastructure, and the "args" storage.

* Deprecates and largely removes `std::task` along with the widespread requirement that there be a "current task" for many APIs in `std`. The entire task infrastructure is replaced with `std::thread`, which provides a more standard API for manipulating and creating native OS threads. In particular, it's possible to join on a created thread, and to get a handle to the currently-running thread. In addition, threads are equipped with some basic blocking support in the form of `park`/`unpark` operations (following a tradition in some OSes as well as the JVM). See the `std::thread` documentation for more details.

* Channels are refactored to use a new internal blocking infrastructure that itself sits on top of `park`/`unpark`.

One important change here is that a Rust program ends when its main thread does, following most threading models. On the other hand, threads will often be created with an RAII-style join handle that will re-institute blocking semantics naturally (and with finer control).

This is very much a:

[breaking-change]

Closes #18000
r? @alexcrichton