I would say that the term "race car" is recognized by the entire population, plus it's self-descriptive if you know the meaning of both of the component words, which are also very well known and easily defined.
It's self-evident that this is not the case for "systems language", else we wouldn't be talking about this. By itself, "system" means almost nothing and it doesn't help one understand the phrase "systems language" at all without prior knowledge. Take a moment to dwell on the mental context of someone that would say this and what it means to them:
You can write a system in any language right?
> should newcomers come under the impression it's .. easy
Newcomers that don't understand the term at first glance come with no impression because it's ambiguous.
> More explanation might be nice
If you have to reference a footnote to describe the word every time you use it, the word has lost its' value as as word. You might as well call it a "peloozoid programming language" [1]. Just use a better word. Or find a qualifier to tack in front of it to make it more clear. And before you dispute the phrase "every time you use it" I would like to take a second to reference nearly every Rust post on HN and the forums where people are confused by the term "systems"; this theme might be more common than the (tiring) rust-vs-go theme.
This whole paragraph almost comes across as intentionally exclusionary. The Rust community is making huge efforts to make Rust more approachable and ergonomic, especially to non-systems programmers†. This effort can extend past the language itself into the way it describes itself.
I'm not delusional, there's no chance that the 4th word on rust-lang.org will change because I made a comment on HN. But I can wish.
† This is one of the great strengths of Rust! You don't need years of experience with manual memory management to not footgun yourself, Rust has your back. With it's FFI and safety story it's in a great position for dynamic language devs to write extensions for their language with minimal experience and investment.
> Take a moment to dwell on the mental context of someone that would say this and what it means to them: You can write a system in any language right?
I understand the point, but not every concept is easily explainable or should be known to everyone as common knowledge. That's wasteful. If someone is confused about a term or how it applies, or if it seems like it's being used in a different context, then they can look it or up ask, like they did here. If I had seen a suggestion that better encapsulated Rust, I would be on board with you in saying it should change, but I haven't seen that yet.
> If you have to reference a footnote to describe the word every time you use it
You don't, unless you are exclusively talking to to people about it that have no industry knowledge or training, and then I think the term is probably either not something they care about or something they should learn about. We don't ask Doctors to change their industry jargon for non doctors, and doctors that don't know it are expected to learn it. Communication is a two way street.
There's a middle ground between making up new words and dumbing down all communication to the simplest words in the language. Neither is particularly useful in the long term. I don't know if Rust has hit a good middle ground, but I do't have a better solution than what I see them doing, and I don't see what I consider better solutions being presented.
You're not wrong; we've always been unsure if "systems" is a good way to describe Rust. It has a lot of advantages, but also a lot of downsides, many of which you discuss here.
It's self-evident that this is not the case for "systems language", else we wouldn't be talking about this. By itself, "system" means almost nothing and it doesn't help one understand the phrase "systems language" at all without prior knowledge. Take a moment to dwell on the mental context of someone that would say this and what it means to them:
You can write a system in any language right?
> should newcomers come under the impression it's .. easy
Newcomers that don't understand the term at first glance come with no impression because it's ambiguous.
> More explanation might be nice
If you have to reference a footnote to describe the word every time you use it, the word has lost its' value as as word. You might as well call it a "peloozoid programming language" [1]. Just use a better word. Or find a qualifier to tack in front of it to make it more clear. And before you dispute the phrase "every time you use it" I would like to take a second to reference nearly every Rust post on HN and the forums where people are confused by the term "systems"; this theme might be more common than the (tiring) rust-vs-go theme.
This whole paragraph almost comes across as intentionally exclusionary. The Rust community is making huge efforts to make Rust more approachable and ergonomic, especially to non-systems programmers†. This effort can extend past the language itself into the way it describes itself.
I'm not delusional, there's no chance that the 4th word on rust-lang.org will change because I made a comment on HN. But I can wish.
† This is one of the great strengths of Rust! You don't need years of experience with manual memory management to not footgun yourself, Rust has your back. With it's FFI and safety story it's in a great position for dynamic language devs to write extensions for their language with minimal experience and investment.
[1]: http://www.wordgenerator.net/fake-word-generator.php