Rust 0.4 released

The note regarding "preliminary JIT support" buried at the end is one of my favorite new features (and it's a tough call, since there's so damn many new features), since it makes stuff like this possible:<p><a href="https://github.com/bleibig/rust-repl" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/bleibig/rust-repl</a><p>I hear that LLVM's JIT support is rather untested, I'd be interested to learn if there are any other major projects besides Rust making use of it.<p>In general, if you haven't checked out Rust yet I'd still recommend waiting until the implementation of traits is finished off (scheduled as a high priority[1] for 0.5, which is tentatively scheduled for sometime around year's end).<p>[1] <a href="https://github.com/mozilla/rust/wiki/Note-0.5-priorities" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/mozilla/rust/wiki/Note-0.5-priorities</a><p>EDIT: Oh, and here's a direct link to the detailed release notes rather than the summary presented in the OP:<p><a href="https://github.com/mozilla/rust/wiki/Doc-detailed-release-notes" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/mozilla/rust/wiki/Doc-detailed-release-no...</a>

So what needs to be done in Rust? It seems like a pretty interesting language, and I have some free time coming up. What kinds of things would people like to see?

My impression is that their push to remove keywords is hurting the readability of Rust code. They also seem undecided about the keyword length issue. In any case, it's really interesting to witness the evolution of the language.

Now that the language syntax is mostly stabilized, i am hoping that more focus will go to the standard library. Currently it seems rather ad hoc and not always consistent (which is understandable because of all the language changes).

IIRC, typestate was one of the big things in the initial releases/presentations of Rust. Is there an overview/discussion/ideas on why it ended up being removed?

One thing I don't understand is the rational behind the decision that the returning expression in a block has to have the semicolon omitted. Why can't we just say the last statement of a block is the returning expression of the block, regardless of semicolon?

I'd like to know how Rust is better/different than Vala. Not the usual feature comparisons, I can look them up myself and have done. But rather if anyone's done programming in both and can compare the experience.

I cannot seem to grasp the scope of this language, so please if any of you fellow gentlemen could enlighten me, i would like to know:<p>What plans does mozilla have for Rust?<p>What are the projected applications?<p>What personal project could be an ideal use case for it?<p>Thanks!

wonder why ret -&#62; return was decided on. the former is sufficiently clear me thinks, shorter too.