Training course · Windsurf · Rust

Windsurf for Rust Developers

Develop with the Windsurf AI IDE and its Cascade agent: flows, memories, rules, workflows and safe use across the team.

Duration
2 days (14 hrs)
Format
Online or on-site
Language
German or English
Participants
open dates or exclusive for your team
Certificate
Certificate of attendance

Overview

This course connects Windsurf with the everyday processes of Rust. Participants work on realistic scenarios and leave with prompts, workflows and checklists they can use straight away.

Windsurf is an AI-powered development environment built around its agent, Cascade. Cascade understands the structure of your project, follows your actions in the editor and terminal, and works with you according to the flow principle: you and the agent take turns on the same task without having to re-explain context over and over. In this two-day course you will learn how to use Cascade effectively for features, debugging and refactoring, and how to make the most of intelligent completion in your daily development work.

To keep results consistent across a team, you steer Cascade with global and workspace rules, rely on memories for lasting project knowledge and automate recurring procedures with workflows that run from a slash command. You will connect external tools through MCP, control how terminal commands are executed and decide which data Cascade is allowed to see. Finally, you will define rules for code review, security and data protection so that Windsurf can be used responsibly within your organisation and its existing processes.

Rust is gaining ground wherever memory safety and performance have to go hand in hand: in systems software, embedded projects, network services, WebAssembly and security-critical components. The learning curve is steep – ownership, lifetimes, traits and async runtimes challenge even experienced developers. AI coding assistants and agents prove to be patient sparring partners here: they explain borrow checker errors, suggest suitable ownership structures, write tests and property-based tests, port C or C++ modules incrementally and work through Clippy lints. Because the compiler gives very precise feedback, agents can iterate all the way to compiling, safe code. This course teaches you to exploit that feedback loop and to scrutinise unsafe code with particular care.

The course is delivered live – either online in a virtual classroom or on-site in our training rooms in Munich, Salzburg, Berlin, Augsburg, Hanover, Bremen, Stuttgart and Kaiserslautern. We can also run it exclusively for your team.

Who is this course for?

  • Rust developers working on systems and back-end projects
  • C and C++ developers moving to Rust or porting modules
  • Embedded and IoT developers using Rust
  • Security and platform teams focused on memory safety

Typical challenges we address

  • Hard-to-understand borrow checker and lifetime errors
  • Complex trait hierarchies, generics and async code with Tokio
  • Laborious porting of existing C or C++ codebases across FFI boundaries
  • Handling unsafe blocks responsibly and justifying each one

What you will be able to do

  • You use Cascade productively in flow for features, debugging and refactoring.
  • You steer Windsurf’s context precisely and keep sensitive content protected.
  • You maintain memories and rules that reliably enforce your project conventions.
  • You automate recurring procedures with workflows and connect external tools via MCP.
  • Use AI agents as sparring partners for ownership, lifetimes, traits and async Rust.
  • Generate tests, ports and services and verify them with the compiler, Clippy and Miri.
  • Systematically assess generated unsafe and FFI code for memory safety.

Course outline

Day 1

Module 1 Getting to know Windsurf and Cascade
  • Installation, importing existing editor settings and basic configuration
  • Cascade in code and chat mode: when the agent edits and when it only advises
  • The flow principle: how Cascade takes your editor and terminal actions into account
  • Intelligent completion and inline commands in everyday development
Module 2 Steering context
  • Understanding codebase indexing and referencing relevant files or directories
  • Bringing documentation, web sources and terminal output into context
  • Excluding sensitive content from context with ignore files
  • Structuring sessions and starting afresh when the topic changes
Module 3 Memories and rules for consistent results
  • Reviewing and maintaining auto-generated and manually created memories
  • Creating and versioning global and workspace rules
  • Expressing architecture, style and testing guidelines as effective rules
  • Activating rules selectively by file pattern or occasion
Module 4 Workflows and automation
  • Defining recurring procedures as workflows and launching them via slash command
  • Building workflows for release preparation, testing or code maintenance
  • Connecting MCP servers for issue trackers, databases or internal services
  • Controlling terminal command execution with allow and deny lists

Day 2

Module 5 Quality, review and governance
  • Tracing Cascade’s changes, accepting them partially or reverting them
  • Using a test-driven approach and preview features for verification
  • Team settings, data protection options and handling of secrets
  • Defining review processes and accountability for AI-generated code
Module 6 Practice lab: Rust
  • Understanding and fixing compiler errors
  • Tests and property-based tests
  • Porting C and C++ modules
  • Async services with Tokio
  • Clippy and idiomatic code
  • Reviewing unsafe code
Module 7 Data protection, quality & transfer to daily work
  • Rust is often used in security-critical components for which the Cyber Resilience Act sets requirements on vulnerability handling and SBOMs. Check new crates for vulnerabilities and licences with cargo-audit or cargo-deny, and treat proprietary systems code as confidential when using cloud-hosted models.
  • Ground rules for safe AI use in your team
  • Checking results: facts, sources, tests and the four-eyes principle
  • Personal action plan for the next 30 days
  • Open questions, outlook and resources for further learning

Practical scenarios from your field

Understanding and fixing compiler errors

The assistant explains borrow checker and lifetime errors in plain language, deliberately proposes alternative ownership structures such as references, Rc or cloning, and iterates with cargo check until the build is clean.

Tests and property-based tests

The AI writes unit and integration tests, doc tests and property-based tests with proptest that check invariants over many generated inputs, uncovering edge cases in parsers or algorithms.

Porting C and C++ modules

Existing code is moved to Rust module by module, FFI bindings are created with bindgen or cbindgen and behaviour is safeguarded by shared tests run against the old and new implementations.

Async services with Tokio

Specifications become HTTP or gRPC services built with Axum or Tonic, including structured error types, graceful shutdown, tracing and sensible handling of cancellation and timeouts.

Clippy and idiomatic code

Clippy lints are worked through systematically, error handling standardised with thiserror or anyhow, and iterators, pattern matching and traits used idiomatically. Existing tests safeguard every change.

Reviewing unsafe code

The agent inventories unsafe blocks, documents their safety invariants, proposes safe alternatives and runs Miri to detect undefined behaviour. Each justification is recorded as a SAFETY comment in the code.

Possible hands-on projects

Fast log parser

A Rust CLI that streams large log files, detects patterns with regular expressions and outputs statistics – with benchmarks comparing it against a scripting-language version.

Axum microservice

A small REST service using Axum, SQLx, structured tracing and integration tests, planned and implemented end to end by an AI agent.

WebAssembly module

A compute-heavy function, such as image processing or validation, packaged as a WebAssembly module with wasm-bindgen and embedded in a simple web page.

Prerequisites

You program regularly in at least one language and are familiar with Git and a modern IDE. Basic Rust experience with Cargo, ownership and traits, plus experience in at least one other systems or back-end language.

Technical requirements

Your own laptop with the Windsurf editor, Git and your usual toolchain installed; a Windsurf account with access to Cascade is required.

Data protection & compliance

Rust is often used in security-critical components for which the Cyber Resilience Act sets requirements on vulnerability handling and SBOMs. Check new crates for vulnerabilities and licences with cargo-audit or cargo-deny, and treat proprietary systems code as confidential when using cloud-hosted models.

Suggested dates

All dates are suggestions – your preferred date is always possible.

  • Thu, 26 November 2026 – Fri, 27 November 2026 Online Request
  • Thu, 10 December 2026 – Fri, 11 December 2026 Stuttgart Request
  • Thu, 14 January 2027 – Fri, 15 January 2027 Online Request
  • Wed, 20 January 2027 – Thu, 21 January 2027 Berlin Request
  • Wed, 3 February 2027 – Thu, 4 February 2027 Online Request
  • Tue, 16 February 2027 – Wed, 17 February 2027 Munich Request

Frequently asked questions

What does Windsurf mean by flows?

Flows describe the close collaboration between you and Cascade. The agent observes what you do in the editor and terminal and takes those actions into account in its next steps. As a result you do not have to keep explaining where you are, and you can move smoothly between doing the work yourself and delegating it to the agent.

How do memories, rules and workflows differ?

Memories store knowledge that Cascade has gathered while working or that you have explicitly recorded. Rules are guidelines you write that shape the agent’s behaviour permanently. Workflows are reusable sequences of steps for recurring tasks, launched with a slash command. Together they keep results consistent across the whole team.

Can I use Windsurf with my existing projects and languages?

Yes. Windsurf is language-agnostic and works with your existing toolchain, including build tools, package managers and test frameworks. Whether you work on back end, front end, data processing or infrastructure code, what matters is giving Cascade good rules and clear context. Each course variant adds the specific focus for your field.

Can AI help me get started with Rust?

Very much so. AI assistants explain compiler errors patiently and in the context of your own code, show alternative approaches and explain why the borrow checker rejects a construct. The key is to understand the explanations rather than accept suggestions blindly, so the course relies on hands-on exercises in which you work out solutions together with the AI.

How reliable are AI ports from C++ to Rust?

They work well for clearly bounded modules when behaviour is protected by tests. The tricky parts are pointer arithmetic, shared mutable state or undefined behaviour in the original. On the course you learn to port incrementally, run differential tests against the old implementation and keep unsafe code to a deliberate minimum.

How much does “Windsurf for Rust Developers” cost?

The course costs a flat €949 plus VAT per participant – whether online or on-site. This includes 2 training day(s) with a live trainer, course materials, a lab environment and a certificate of attendance.

Can I suggest my own date?

Yes. Our suggested dates are just a guide. In the request form you can always describe your preferred date or period in free text – we check availability and confirm within one working day.

Is the course online or on-site?

Both are possible: live online in a virtual classroom or on-site in Munich, Salzburg, Berlin, Augsburg, Hanover, Bremen, Stuttgart or Kaiserslautern. We can also run the course exclusively for your team.

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