He Rewrote the Entire Codebase in Rust — Then Fired Everyone

You know that one engineer who thinks rewriting everything will fix all the world’s problems? Yeah, this is that story. Except this time, he actually did it — rewrote the entire product in Rust… and then fired the whole team. Let’s unpack this masterpiece of engineering ego, tech idealism, and a bit of good old-fashioned chaos 💥

The Great Rewrite Syndrome

Every engineering team eventually meets that guy.  The one who looks at your spaghetti code and says with the confidence of a man who’s just watched one YouTube tutorial on Rust:

“This code is trash. We need to rewrite it from scratch. In Rust. For performance.” Oh yes, the Great Rewrite Syndrome is real. It starts small — “Let’s clean a few modules.” Then it becomes “Let’s rebuild the backend.” Before you know it, your product is gone, your team is gone, and you’ve got a shiny Rust app that doesn’t actually… do anything.

Sound familiar? You might’ve seen similar chaos in the Monolith vs Microservices debate — everyone’s convinced their way is the holy gospel.

Why Rust? Because “It’s Fast”

Now, don’t get me wrong — Rust is amazing. Memory safety, concurrency, and performance so good it makes C++ sweat. But the problem isn’t Rust. The problem is the people who think Rust will magically fix bad architecture, messy processes, and unclear product goals.

Rewriting in Rust won’t fix your broken deployment pipeline, Bob. It’ll just make your mistakes faster and memory-safe.

If your foundation is weak, rewriting it in Rust is like rebuilding a crooked house with titanium walls — impressive, but still crooked.

The Fallout: One Man’s Rewrite Is Another Team’s Resignation

Here’s how these stories usually go:

One engineer proposes a Rust rewrite.
The rest of the team rolls their eyes.
Leadership somehow approves it (probably after reading a Medium post).
Six months later, the rewrite is “90% done” — which in dev math means nowhere near done.
The team burns out, arguments start, and management loses patience.

And then — boom 💥 — layoffs, rewrites abandoned, and everyone’s updating their LinkedIn with “open to work.”

Honestly, it’s the same pattern we’ve seen in the industry for years. Remember the teams that migrated entire data stacks only to realize they didn’t need half those tools? (Cough like the ones who think every data pipeline needs DBT cough).

🦀 What Rust Actually Fixes

Rust does solve real problems — just not organizational ones. Here’s what Rust helps with 👇

Memory safety without garbage collection
Concurrency without data races
Performance close to C/C++
Dev satisfaction (it’s genuinely fun to write once you stop crying about lifetimes)

But here’s what Rust won’t fix:

Poor system design
Unrealistic deadlines
Lack of testing discipline
Bad communication
Ego-driven leadership

If you want your system to actually scale and stay sane, you might need better architecture, not just a new language. Maybe start with understanding Hexagonal vs Layered Architecture first.

Lessons From the “Rust Rewrite Apocalypse”

So what can we learn from this Rust-gone-wrong soap opera?

Never rewrite everything at once. Gradual migrations are boring but they actually work.
Rust is powerful — but not magical. Use it when performance or safety truly matters, not just because it’s trendy.
Culture beats syntax. A good team in Python will outship a toxic team in Rust any day.
Performance means nothing without purpose. Optimizing what doesn’t matter is just expensive overengineering.

Think of it like rewriting your entire life because your handwriting was bad. The problem wasn’t the pen, my friend — it was your process.

Real-World Alternatives to the “Full Rewrite” Fantasy

Before you burn your old codebase to the ground, consider these saner moves 👇

Incremental Refactoring: Start with your bottlenecks. Fix, measure, repeat.
Modularization: Convert critical parts to Rust as libraries or microservices.
Use Python or Go bridges: For example, check out faster DAG orchestration tools in Airflow Alternatives.
Benchmark before you brag: Maybe your “slow” app just needs a fast JSON parser.

Even machine learning folks know better than to start from scratch — they validate before they leap.

The Engineering Ego Trap

We developers are creative — but also dramatic. We dream in code and sometimes think “rewriting” is like hitting the reset button on all our bad choices. But software isn’t therapy. You can’t fix burnout or technical debt by starting over. If you must rebuild, do it for a reason — not an emotion. And maybe, just maybe, don’t fire the team that helped you get there.

Final Thoughts: Rust Is Great. Rewrites Usually Aren’t.

Rust deserves the hype. It’s elegant, powerful, and makes systems safer. But rewriting your entire product because you fell in love with the syntax? That’s how startups die and memes are born. Remember: great engineering isn’t about chasing shiny tools — it’s about solving problems sustainably. And if you still feel the urge to rewrite everything… maybe take a walk first. Or at least read a few cautionary tales. Like this one 😉

Read the full article here: https://medium.com/shark-engineering/rust-rewrite-codebase-story-1b00a563438b