Crosscut

As I said, I like designs that are simple, orthogonal, and composable. And yesterday, I showed how data types in Rust aren't that; because they mix up three different concepts:

• The structure of a type: Its memory layout; what it contains.
• The name that can be used to refer to a type.
• Whether the type is structural or nominal.

I believe that by keeping these concepts separate, we can create a design that is easier to understand, because it is made up of simple elements that each do one thing only. At the same time, such a design could be more powerful, if we allow those elements to be composed.