{
  "id": 16786338,
  "title": "Four Months of Zig",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/10/27/four-months-of-zig",
  "topic": "tech",
  "section": "Tech",
  "published": "2026-10-27T18:46:09.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Lobsters",
    "slug": "lobsters",
    "url": "https://gracefulliberty.com/articles/four-months-of-zig/"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "It has been approximately four months since my return to Zig, following a few years of absence. During this period, I have immersed myself in writing software using Zig and reconnected with both the online and in-person community. I felt compelled to share my experiences, highlighting the aspects I appreciate about Zig and areas that require improvement. To illustrate, I will incorporate comparisons to Rust, which has been my go-to language thus far. My inaugural project in Zig was snurl, a library designed for interacting with the smallnet, encompassing protocols such as Gemini, Finger, Gopher, Spartan, and more. My objective was to offer an alternative to curl for the smallnet, maintaining comparable testing and fuzzing standards yet on a more compact scale. Early on, I encountered an issue with the fuzzer not functioning correctly. Initially, I was enthusiastic about fuzzing, as discussed in my previous post, but upon realizing that the feature was not yet completed, I felt somewhat disappointed. This was particularly disheartening, considering Zig's current standing, as the fuzzer is demonstrated in the generated main.zig file provided by zig init. Concurrently, I developed two additional programs that remain unpublished. The first is a small terminal user interface (TUI) typing race, which proved simpler than anticipated to create a minimum viable product. The second is an n-body simulator incorporating stellar evolution, utilizing raylib. The most thrilling development in recent months was my attendance at a local Zig Day. I discovered that Zig Day Seattle was taking place on August 20th, and I was thrilled to learn that there was a Zig Day event in my vicinity. Being able to engage with Andrew Kelley, the creator of Zig, added an extra layer of excitement. Zig Days are local meetups where individuals passionate about Zig convene, collaborate on projects, and discuss Zig. For this particular Zig Day, I aimed to work on snurl. A friend, Evin Yulo, also decided to attend. The event took place in the Bothell library, which later shifted to the Bellevue library due to overwhelming attendance. Witnessing the creator of Zig at the event certainly contributed to its appeal. I value the format of these Zig Days and am grateful for their existence within our community. They foster a more interconnected feeling among the Zig community, facilitating interactions among individuals who share a passion for the language. Additionally, the presence of Zig's creator provides a unique opportunity for direct engagement. During the Zig Day, I had the chance to converse with fellow programmers about their respective projects. It is my hope that such exchanges will foster cross-pollination of ideas, ultimately strengthening all our endeavors. After the event, I continued working on snurl alongside Evin, who was exploring the integration of Zig's standard library TLS implementation as an alternative backend. I also had a brief conversation with Andrew Kelley. I eagerly anticipate future Zig Days and am optimistic about attending Zig Day Seattle again in the future. I look forward to potentially joining others at Zig Day Portland prior to the next local gathering. Connecting with fellow enthusiasts of Zig and its values is a rewarding experience for me. I am particularly fond of Zig's requirement for passing IO and allocator parameters to functions. Although this may be inconvenient for certain one-off scripts, I appreciate being able to explicitly specify the allocator for each function. This explicitness aids in understanding which functions allocate memory and enables me to avoid potential issues arising from passing the incorrect allocator. Compared to other languages, such as Rust, Zig's approach to memory allocation is more transparent and less prone to unintended memory usage. Likewise, the IO parameter in Zig functions that interact with the operating system is a powerful feature. It provides context for input, output, and other system-related operations. This feature makes porting Zig to new operating systems relatively straightforward, as it primarily involves adapting the IO implementation. Testing becomes more manageable as well, since the IO parameter allows for the creation of custom testing instances tailored to specific scenarios. I have already begun leveraging this flexibility in my own projects. Overall, Zig strikes a balance between simplicity and powerful features, offering a low floor and a high ceiling for developers. Comptime, a seamless metaprogramming capability, is another aspect of Zig that I find particularly appealing. It enables metaprogramming in a manner that feels natural and integrated within the language, without sacrificing clarity or performance.",
  "summary": null,
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}