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Canonical is Funding a PhD to Automate C to Rust Translation for Ubuntu (itsfoss.com)
submitted 6 days ago by cm0002@europe.pub to c/linux@programming.dev
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As part of the collaboration between Canonical and the University of Bristol, the project will target AppArmor and snap-confine as industrial case studies. Both are critical to Ubuntu’s security posture, and provide a substantially harder test than isolated translation examples. They will help us evaluate whether the techniques can cope with the structure and constraints of mature production software.

Note that this is not a commitment to replace AppArmor or snap-confine with what is generated, rather that we have a vested interest in the software and are keen to see the results.

The most optimistic outcome would be a system capable of translating substantial C repositories into Rust with strong evidence of behavioural equivalence and relatively little manual intervention. The research could also produce better methods for decomposing repositories, stronger validation techniques, reusable translation datasets, improved program-repair tools and a more precise understanding of where automated migration stops being reliable

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[-] illusionist@lemmy.zip 3 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

That sounds like an all in one solution. Only for the cheap price of a Phd.

Would you like to get a licence change on top?

[-] ISO@lemmy.zip 9 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

Wow! What an observant smart thought.

Well, except for the fact that code conversion doesn't give you the permission to change licenses or remove copyright. And the small matter of fact that both projects mentioned are Canonical projects, where whatever code that is not directly copyrighted by Canonical, is contributed by someone who signed an agreement with this stipulation:

(b) To the maximum extent permitted by the relevant law, You grant to Us a perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, transferable, royalty-free, irrevocable licence under the Copyright covering the Contribution, with the right to sublicense such rights through multiple tiers of sublicensees, to reproduce, modify, display, perform and distribute the Contribution as part of the Material; provided that this license is conditioned upon compliance with Section 2.3.

"Us" being Canonical of course. So they could actually "re-license" the projects right now, without changing a single line of code.

It's always astonishing how condiment in their ignorance people are when it comes to these matters.

this post was submitted on 22 Aug 2026
44 points (95.8% liked)

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