Ubuntu Goes Rust for Coreutils, Community Splits

Ubuntu 26.10 completed its transition to Rust-based coreutils (uutils), replacing the GNU equivalents. The reaction on HN was not celebratory. Commenters flagged a concrete bug: 'rm' cannot remove all possible directory entries in the new version, which is a serious regression for a core utility. Others noted that installing the GNU coreutils alternative now breaks build-essential, locking users into the Rust version.

The broader critique is that Canonical is moving fast on ideological grounds (memory safety, Rust) without fully validating correctness. The FSF history of Ubuntu shipping Amazon spyware got dredged up as context for why people distrust Canonical's judgment on these calls.

There is a real counterargument: Rust coreutils will eventually be more robust, and the GNU tools have their own long tail of quirks. But shipping a version where 'rm' doesn't fully work is the kind of regression that damages trust, especially for a utility that, when it fails, usually fails catastrophically.