Rust is a statically compiled, fast language with great tooling and a rapidly growing ecosystem. That makes it a great fit for writing command line applications: They should be small, portable, and quick to run. Command line applications are also a great way to get started with learning Rust; or to introduce Rust to your team!

Writing a program with a simple command line interface (CLI) is a great exercise for a beginner who is new to the language and wants to get a feel for it. There are many aspects to this topic, though, that often only reveal themselves later on.

This book is structured like this: We start with a quick tutorial, after which you'll end up with a working CLI tool. You'll be exposed to a few of the core concepts of Rust as well as the main aspects of CLI applications. What follows are chapters that go into more detail on some of these aspects.

One last thing before we dive right into CLI applications: If you find an error in this book or want to help us write more content for it, you can find its source in the CLI book repository. We'd love to hear your feedback! Thank you!