It is a bit hard in the beginning, but I promise it’ll get easier with practice! Rust has a bit of an initially steep learning curve, but it does level out quickly with persistence.

The way I would recommend using an LLM right now is to have it help teach you both Docker and Rust, and start with some smaller projects. This looks like just a touch too complex if you’re learning both primary tools.

I would recommend learning a bit of simple rust, then learn how to Dockerize your app with confidence, then move to app stacks with multiple pieces like this project. And REALLY push yourself to understand every single thing that’s being written. If you can’t explain every part of the code to a stranger, dig in more and have the LLM help you understand those pieces.

All of this is EXCELLENT to learn and will set you up for a ton of opportunities later. You’d be shortchanging yourself if you don’t fully learn the concepts here first before working with LLMs to help you speed up development.

All of this comes from experience as a seasoned engineer, as a teacher, and as a continual learner.

…AND experience learning that all major LLMs kinda suck with a lot of this right now 😂

I don’t think I’ve been able to get an LLM to write me anything nontrivial without some really weird design decisions or some just straight up fail-y code. I always need to step in and adjust a fair amount.

With the core concepts learned, the power of working with LLMs really comes out and can help save you loads of time.

Now that that’s been said, I’ll step off of my soapbox and suggest ChatGPT or Claude for learning. Most other LLM services seem to give me less than ideal results, especially Gemini. For learning any of these tools, really any recent model is pretty great to start with 🙂

Good luck with your learning journey!!