iRust: Interactive Rust REPL

Rust does not presently have a Read Eval Print Loop (REPL) that allows interactive usage of the language on-the-fly without the need to write full programs. Or rather, Rust does ship a REPL, but it's broken and won't be fixed until Rust natively supports JIT compilation.

iRust is a Ruby-powered band-aid of a Rust REPL that shells out to the Rust compiler for you and lets you use the language semi-interactively. It's not great, but if you're looking for a way to play around with Rust quickly and easily, it might get the job done.

To use iRust you must first install Rust. Please refer to the Rust README for Rust installation directions. Or if you're an impatient Mac user and you have Homebrew installed, run:

$ brew install rust

After you've installed Rust, you'll need Ruby. You can find installers for Ruby for various platforms here:

• Windows: RubyInstaller
• Mac or Linux: RVM
• Mac or Linux: chruby
• Java: JRuby

Next, install the irust gem:

$ gem install irust

Congrats, it should be installed and working now!

Now that you have iRust installed, run:

$ irust

This should give you the following prompt:

Using rustc 0.9-pre (619c4fc 2013-12-23 11:26:34 -0800)
irust>

Now type some fancy Rust expressions and watch them get magically evaluated before your eyes!

irust> 2+2
4 : int
irust>

Technology!

• Fork this repository on github
• Make your changes and send us a pull request
• If we like them we'll merge them

Copyright (c) 2014 Tony Arcieri. Distributed under the MIT License. See LICENSE.txt for further details.