Concurrency is a common requirement in embedded systems, from handling multiple sensor inputs to managing network communications. However, it's also a notorious source of bugs like deadlocks, race conditions, and priority inversions in traditional languages. Rust offers powerful features to manage concurrency safely and efficiently, even in resource-constrained embedded environments.
Rust's ownership and borrowing system, combined with its strong type system, allows developers to write concurrent code that is free from data races at compile time. This eliminates an entire class of bugs that are notoriously difficult to debug in production. We explore various concurrency primitives available in Rust, including `Mutex`, `RwLock`, and channels, and how they can be applied effectively in embedded contexts.
Furthermore, we discuss the use of asynchronous Rust (`async/await`) for non-blocking I/O and event-driven programming in embedded systems, enabling more responsive and efficient applications without the overhead of a full-blown RTOS. This article provides practical examples and best practices for taming concurrency in your embedded Rust projects.