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DARPA suggests turning old C code automatically into Rust – using AI, of course (www.theregister.com)

submitted 4 months ago by [email protected] to c/programming

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To accelerate the transition to memory safe programming languages, the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is driving the development of TRACTOR, a programmatic code conversion vehicle.

The term stands for TRanslating All C TO Rust. It's a DARPA project that aims to develop machine-learning tools that can automate the conversion of legacy C code into Rust.

The reason to do so is memory safety. Memory safety bugs, such buffer overflows, account for the majority of major vulnerabilities in large codebases. And DARPA's hope is that AI models can help with the programming language translation, in order to make software more secure.

"You can go to any of the LLM websites, start chatting with one of the AI chatbots, and all you need to say is 'here's some C code, please translate it to safe idiomatic Rust code,' cut, paste, and something comes out, and it's often very good, but not always," said Dan Wallach, DARPA program manager for TRACTOR, in a statement.

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[–] [email protected] 47 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

Code works in C

Want to make it safer

Put it into a fucking LLM

You know sometimes I wonder if I'm an idiot or that maybe I just don't have the right family connections to get a super high paying job

[–] douglasg14b 4 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Too bad commenters are as bad as reading articles as LLMs are at handling complex scenarios. And are equally as confident with their comments.

This is a pretty level headed, calculated, approach DARPA is taking (as expected from DARPA).