This is coming full circle back to how `rust-analyzer` originally got introduced: it was an alternative to the official `rls` (Rust lanaguage server) intended to provide better performance and eventually became the new official one. I've seen enough issues with rust-analyzer in the wild with coworkers having trouble getting it working well for their setups that I'm open to the idea that an alternative might be needed again, but I can't help but also be disappointed that we've gotten to this point yet again (not blaming the author of this tool of course; they're not the cause, just responding to the symptom).

Tangential, but I've found something LLMs are actually ridiculously good at is making LSP servers.

I couldn't find good TLA+ bindings for Neovim, so I got Claude to hack together an LSP server for it [1]. It works shockingly well, and it only took about an hour of arguing with Claude to do it.

I find it's not terribly good at actually writing TLA+ (with some very recent tests with Fable), so I'm not completely useless yet.

[1] https://github.com/Tombert/TLA-Language-Server-Protocol

Hey! Author here. Happy to answer any questions.

I personally don’t agree with “LLMs are just a tool” but I’m honestly impressed by the author’s description of LLM usage and taking the responsibility for the code. IMHO, without having looked at the code base itself, this sounds like a pretty healthy way to approach LLM usage!

this is awesome and I hope this gains some real steam, we're building everything in rust and locally if i'm watching youtube and running a build+tests and my vscodium starts running the analyzer at the same time I've seen my machine stutter out as it eats up the memory.

While I respect the work behind rust-analyzer greatly and think it's a good part of how cool the language is, I will NEVER understand the design decision to flat out refuse using disk cache. I understand the argument that implementing this puts less pressure behind speeding up the indexing process, but honestly with the price of ram today I'm tired of the memory and cpu usage each rust-analyzer process takes up. Especially since we do more and more parallel work.

I honestly think it's the wrong philosophy. Once again I'm a nobody compared to maintainers, so take my opinion with a grain of salt

This is music to my ears. Going to try this now.

Will give it a shot and loved the "LLMs were used as a tool, not as a brain replacement"

Good work, though can't help but think that when something that isn't just a small hack where perf doesn't matter can be made "100x faster", it tells more about the original work than the new thing :D

RA with disk cache?

Don't want to derail. Of course lighter RA is very welcome!

But I can't wait for the moral panic driving us to all pussy-foot around LLMs to die with prejudice.

Virgins often at some point in their lives assume that not having sex means they have achieved some higher level of self-control, a privileged position upon a high precipice from which they can judge others. They gather, stew, and throw stones at individuals who are going to and fro, living their lives.

Any and every gathering can mob individuals. It is not inherently moral to find yourself in a troupe. You have not reached "consensus" except within a single Discord room, a subreddit, some cesspool of comments on HN. No amount of back-slapping idiocy and corrupt self-evaluation will make any mob any more than just that.

I often say that the difference between an engineer and a mechanic is that the engineer can make a rocket fly the first time (given enough time). Still, good engineers know that time is a trade-off, that exposing errors and motivating problems sooner is very, very worth it. They contain failures. They pull errors forward in time.

But along come those most enabled by LLMs, the idiotic brigades of co-enablers who know only the high quality software made by others. They are experts in what they must be provided in order to open their wallets, and they bring this expertise into the arena of those sharing ideas. Ideas are rough, and idiots are not fond of them.

Lo the brigades demand the engineer never to show them anything that is not perfect. The brigades complain endlessly of laziness while giving no effort themselves. The brigades expect engineers with twenty years of experience make the inefficient time tradeoff of coding everything by hand even before having any idea if what they're building will be wanted by the world.

The brigades want the perfect software, but not the ugly, filthy process from which it is forged. They want it to impress them the first time they see it. They want it to be easy, low-price, available at the push of a button. They want it yesterday and without bugs. Add "Don't use LLMs!" to the list of unreasonable and ignorant demands.

The brigades hate a world where you can't trust a project from its heft and good looking README alone. They hate that what they have never had any interest in reading at all can now no longer be blindly trusted. They hate these LLMs. They hate them, HATE THEM!!! They hate the laziness, the long-winded replies, the hallucinations...

At the culmination of their frustrations, the brigades turn to the engineer with precise instruction: "Give me only the answer. Make no mistakes." We owe these lazy shits nothing.

To clarify, author is https://github.com/popzxc, not me! My thoughts are here: https://matklad.github.io/2026/08/21/rust-glancer.html

Waiting for RA to build up the full in memory data structure for a large workspace is so painful. Honestly, I'd just assumed that was the only way and didn't realize Rust Rover was different.

Does anyone have experience using that? Any tradeoffs?

Why don't people explain their acronyms? What is a Rust LSP?

wonderful IDEA! Often two much ram cost using nvim with LSP, it may be work!

Forking it!

> It can use very little memory (target <100mb for reasonable projects).

We live in a strange world.