Given how long and widely C++ has been a dominant language, I don’t think anyone can reasonably expect to get rid of all the unsafe code, regardless of approach. There is a lot of it.
However, changing the proposition from “get good at Rust and rewrite these projects from scratch” to “adopt some incremental changes using the existing tooling and skills you already have” would lower the barrier to entry considerably. I think this more practical approach would be likely to reach far more projects.
The inherent problem with this kind of solution is that if you don’t break backwards compatibility, you don’t get rid off all the insecure code.
And if you do break backwards compatibility, there’s not much reason to stick to C++ rather than going for Rust with its established ecosystem…
Given how long and widely C++ has been a dominant language, I don’t think anyone can reasonably expect to get rid of all the unsafe code, regardless of approach. There is a lot of it.
However, changing the proposition from “get good at Rust and rewrite these projects from scratch” to “adopt some incremental changes using the existing tooling and skills you already have” would lower the barrier to entry considerably. I think this more practical approach would be likely to reach far more projects.