Dr. Jim Anderson of University of South Florida

Many of us are familiar with some of the most popular programming languages: C and C++. C was developed over 50 years ago and C++ was created over 44 years ago. The world was a lot different back then and the security threats that software faces today did not exist. The NSA recently released a statement that both C and C++ are not recommended languages for new projects because of their security weaknesses. So what's a software developer to do?

In this presentation, we'll be introducing the RUST programming language. Rust was developed to provide a secure way to do systems level programming. The popularity of Rust has been soaring over the past few years. One measure of its acceptance is that the Linux project is now accepting code changes that are coded in Rust – no other language has this privilege.

We'll cover the structure of the Rust language, the types of variables that it supports, and how it goes about ensuring that code created in Rust will be "memory safe". Just as a cautionary note: over and over again Rust is identified as being the most loved AND the most feared new language to learn. We'll take some of mystery out of the arrival of this new language for you!

Biography:

Dr. Jim Anderson received his PhD in Computer Science from Florida Atlantic University, Boca Raton. He then went on an earned an MBA from The University Of Texas, Dallas. He has published over 125 books including CRC Press’s “Software Defined Networking”. Jim has worked for 16 different companies during his 33-year career including startups as well as Boeing, Siemens, Alcatel, Verizon, AAA, and Amgen. He has had opportunities to teach at Florida Atlantic University, The University of South Florida, and Florida Polytechnic University. Despite his busy work schedule, Jim has been able to publish 5 papers and has been an invited speaker 8 times. Jim has been an active member of the IEEE for over 30 years and has held numerous leadership positions at both the local and regional level. Jim has been a member of Toastmasters for 22 years. He manages 5 highly successful blogs and is the owner of LinkedIn’s most successful product management user group.

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