Building a Full-Stack Web App with Rust
Setup and Configuration
To get started, you’ll need a recent Rust installation and a Postgres database running on port 7878 (e.g., using Docker). We’ll create a multimodule workspace using Cargo, which will allow us to share code between the frontend and backend parts of our application.
cargo new --bin fullstack_app
cd fullstack_app
cargo new common
cargo new frontend --bin
cargo new backend --binShared Code and Common Functionality
Our application will consist of three separate Rust projects: common, frontend, and backend. The common project will hold the shared code between the frontend and backend, including data models and helpers.
// common/src/models.rs
pub struct Owner {
pub id: i32,
pub name: String,
}
pub struct Pet {
pub id: i32,
pub owner_id: i32,
pub name: String,
}Backend Development
For the backend, we’ll use the Warp web framework and the Diesel database library. We’ll define our database schema, create a database connection pool, and implement API endpoints for listing owners, fetching owner details, creating owners, creating pets, and deleting pets.
// backend/src/main.rs
use warp::{Filter, Reply};
#[derive(Deserialize)]
struct CreateOwner {
name: String,
}
async fn create_owner(create_owner: CreateOwner) -> Result {
// Implement create owner logic
Ok("Owner created successfully!")
}Frontend Development
For the frontend, we’ll use Yew, a Rust-based framework for building web applications. We’ll create a simple web app with routing, forms, and API calls to the backend. Our app will feature a detailed view for owners and their list of pets, enabling users to delete and add pets as needed.
// frontend/src/main.rs
use yew::{html, Component, Context, Html, Msg};
struct App {
owners: Vec<Owner>,
}
enum Msg {
FetchOwners,
CreateOwner(String),
}
impl Component<Context> for App {
type Message = Msg;
type Properties = ();
fn create(ctx: &Context<Self>) -> Self {
App {
owners: vec![],
}
}
fn update(&mut self, ctx: &Context<Self>, msg: Self::Message) -> bool {
match msg {
Msg::FetchOwners => {
// Implement fetch owners logic
true
}
Msg::CreateOwner(name) => {
// Implement create owner logic
true
}
}
}
fn view(&self, ctx: &Context<Self>) -> Html {
html! {
<h1>{"Owner List"}</h1>
<ul>
{ self.owners.iter().map(|owner| html! {
<li>{ &owner.name }</li>
}).collect<Html>() }
</ul>
}
}
}Testing and Deployment
Once we’ve completed the implementation, we can run both the frontend and backend with a Postgres database running on port 7878. We can test the application by creating owners, adding pets, and deleting them.
cargo run --bin backend
cargo run --bin frontendDebugging and Performance Monitoring
Debugging Rust applications can be challenging, especially when users experience issues that are hard to reproduce. Consider using tools that provide full visibility into web frontends for Rust apps, allowing you to monitor and track performance, automatically surface errors, and more.
- Use a debugger: Rust has a built-in debugger called rust-lldb.
- Logging: Use logging libraries like log to track application events.
- Performance monitoring: Utilize tools like prometheus to monitor application performance.