🦀 Crafting Lambda Functions in Rust: v0.0.6 is here with lots of improvements!

Hello, serverless Rust enthusiasts! 🦀

We hope this message finds you well!

Though we've been a bit quiet lately, we've been hard at work on Crafting Lambda Functions in Rust throughout the summer. We’re making steady progress on Chapters 5 and 6, which we hope to release soon! In the meantime, we’ve been thrilled to receive such an overwhelming amount of feedback from all of you. Your comments, suggestions, and corrections have been invaluable.

We rolled up our sleeves and revisited the first four chapters to incorporate your feedback and ensure everything was polished. This effort resulted in 6 pull requests, addressing 22 different issues in our private GitHub repository. This included a major refactoring of the code examples throughout chapters 2, 3, and 4! It’s the kind of work we love doing because it helps make the book even better for you. So, please keep your feedback coming!

We’re also excited to announce a new technical reviewer! But before we introduce them, let’s go over some of the latest updates.

🗞️ What’s new

While we don’t have new chapters just yet, there have been plenty of improvements:

• Added various copyright and editorial information.

• Listings and figures are now numbered by chapter for easier reference.

• Fixed numerous small issues and typos (huge thanks to Daniel Pape, Elias Brange, Joe, Toby, Tony_, Jaga Santagostino, Jocelyn Facchini, and many others!).

• Clarified the use of --data-ascii and aws-lambda-events with cargo lambda invoke (thanks to steveuba).

• Provided guidance on resolving potential cross-compilation issues when cargo-zigcc is missing (thanks to steveuba).

• Added a note on using cargo add as an alternative way to install dependencies (thanks to Tony_).

• Explained how to address transient dependency issues with crates using openssl-sys (thanks to emnul).

• Noted that the API Gateway default timeout can now be extended beyond 29 seconds (thanks to Elias Brange).

• Recommended using rustup to install Rust (thanks to Joe).

• Explained why we use the cuid2 library for generating IDs (thanks to Tony_).

• Simplified the implementation of the handler logic in Chapters 3 and 4 (big thanks to Svend Vanderveken for initiating this refactoring).

• Made additional styling and readability improvements.

And now, we’re happy to introduce our new technical reviewer!

👋 Hello, Irine

Please join us in welcoming Irine Kokilashvili, our new technical reviewer!

Irine is a DevOps enthusiast by day and a passionate hobbyist programmer by night. With a background in DevOps engineering, she brings expertise in automating complex systems and processes to drive efficiency.

A self-proclaimed fan of creative problem-solving, Irine is particularly drawn to Rust programming language for its performance and reliability. When not pushing code or optimizing server performance, you'll find her experimenting with innovative solutions - often fueled by duct tape and the occasional brainstorming session with her trusty sidekick (yes, that's a rubber duck!).

With experience in cloud engineering, specifically AWS, and currently working as a Platform Engineer at Space International, Irine is dedicated to harnessing the power of technology to drive innovation. Her passion for automation, cloud computing, and software development makes her a valuable asset to any team.

We're thrilled to have Irine as a technical reviewer. Her expertise in Rust and cloud engineering will undoubtedly help us deliver high-quality content.

📦 How to get the new release

If you own a copy of Crafting Lambda Functions in Rust, getting the new release should be a breeze!

• Go to Gumroad, login, and visit your product library

• This is the list of the products you have purchased, you should see “Crafting Lambda functions in Rust (e-book)“ in there.

• If you click on it you will get to a page with all the download links

You will find all the updated code examples in our code repository.

Let us know if you have any trouble with this! We are here to help!

👂 We want to hear your feedback

Your feedback is incredibly important to us. Even if you don’t have specific suggestions, we’d love to hear your thoughts on the book so far. Which parts did you enjoy the most? Were there any sections that were unclear or something you felt was missing? Feel free to connect with us on Discord or via email – we truly value your input.

If you’re feeling extra generous, consider leaving us a review on Gumroad. It would help us a lot! As of now, we have very few reviews, so we’d greatly appreciate your support! 🤩

🔮 What’s next

We’re making great progress on Chapters 5 and 6, where we’ll dive into code structure and testing. While we don’t have a set release date yet, we’re aiming to have them out before the end of September (I know, I know we promised you the end of August last time, but as devs, we will try to get away with shitty estimates 🥸). Plus, we have a few more reviewers lined up, and we can’t wait to introduce them to you!

Thank you for reading, and your continued support!

Stay safe, and keep up the great work with serverless Rust!

— Luciano & James