#AskFedi: does anyone have a good article that explains *in depth* what Cell and RefCell are for in #Rust? So not just "this is what they do" or "this is how they work", but more questions like "why does this exist", "why would you need this", "what other approaches could have been taken and why was this one better".
(Do not send me ad-hoc explanations please; an explanation that fits into a toot is almost certainly not going to be in-depth enough here. I'm looking for articles that were written with deliberation and review.)
@joepie91 Not ideal, but this has some of the explanation. https://blog.iany.me/2019/02/rust-cell-and-refcell/
@modulux Yep, I did read that, but unfortunately it doesn't really talk about the "why does it exist", so I'm having a lot of trouble understanding it in context - and I don't really want to just "add it whenever the compiler complains" either, I need a mental model to reason about where it's appropriate, basically.
@joepie91 Right, it just has a bit of historical background of why it was introduced. The other resource I have on it is this one, neither is, I think, very complete. https://badboi.dev/rust/2020/07/17/cell-refcell.html
@modulux Oh, this one looks closer to what I'm looking for at a glance - will give it a read, thanks 🙂
