Rust quick start

At the end of this guide, you will have created a simple Rust Hello, World! program that connects to the Memgraph database and executes simple queries.

Prerequisites

To follow this guide, you will need:

• A running Memgraph instance. If you need to set up Memgraph, take a look at the Installation guide.
• A basic understanding of graph databases and the property graph model.
• Docker installed and running. Instructions on how to setup Docker can be found on the official Docker website.
• The rsmgclient driver. A Memgraph database adapter for the Rust programming language. (if you are not using Docker)

info

NOTE: We recommend using Docker because it simplifies installing the driver dependencies. If you don't wish to use Docker, you will need to install the rsmgclient driver locally.

Basic setup

We'll be using a Dockerized Rust program to demonstrate how to connect to a running Memgraph database instance. If you don't wish to use Docker, the steps might be slightly different, but the code is most likley the same or very similar.

Let's jump in and connect a simple program to Memgraph.

1. Create a new Rust project with the name memgraph_rust by running the following command:

cargo new memgraph_rust --bin

2. Add the following line to the Cargo.toml file under the line [dependencies]:

rsmgclient = "0.1.1"

3. To create the actual program, add the following code to the src/main.rs file:

use rsmgclient::{ConnectParams, Connection, SSLMode};


fn main(){
    // Parameters for connecting to database.
    let connect_params = ConnectParams {
        host: Some(String::from("172.17.0.2")),
        sslmode: SSLMode::Disable,
        ..Default::default()
    };

    // Make a connection to the database.
    let mut connection = match Connection::connect(&connect_params) {
        Ok(c) => c,
        Err(err) => panic!("{}", err)
    };

    // Execute a query.
    let query = "CREATE (u:User {name: 'Alice'})-[:Likes]->(m:Software {name: 'Memgraph'}) RETURN u, m";
    match connection.execute(query, None) {
        Ok(columns) => println!("Columns: {}", columns.join(", ")),
        Err(err) => panic!("{}", err)
    };

    // Fetch all query results.
    match connection.fetchall() {
        Ok(records) => {
            for value in &records[0].values {
                println!("{}", value);
            }
        },
        Err(err) => panic!("{}", err)
    };


    // Commit any pending transaction to the database.
    match connection.commit() {
        Ok(()) => {},
        Err(err) => panic!("{}", err)
    };
}

4. Create a new file in the project root directory /memgraph_rust and name it Dockerfile. Add the following code to it:

# Set base image (host OS)
FROM rust:1.42

# Install CMake
RUN apt-get update && \
  apt-get --yes install cmake

# Install mgclient
RUN apt-get install -y git cmake make gcc g++ libssl-dev && \
  git clone https://github.com/memgraph/mgclient.git /mgclient && \
  cd mgclient && \
  git checkout 5ae69ea4774e9b525a2be0c9fc25fb83490f13bb && \
  mkdir build && \
  cd build && \
  cmake .. && \
  make && \
  make install

# Set the working directory in the container
WORKDIR /code

# Copy the dependencies file to the working directory
COPY Cargo.toml .

# Copy the content of the local src directory to the working directory
RUN mkdir src
COPY src/ ./src

# Generate binary using the Rust compiler
RUN cargo build

# Command to run on container start
CMD [ "cargo", "run" ]

5. Don't forget to change the host address in your code.
Find the CONTAINER ID with docker ps and use it in the following command to retrieve the address:

docker inspect -f '{{range.NetworkSettings.Networks}}{{.IPAddress}}{{end}}' CONTAINER ID

6. To run the application, first, you need to create a Docker image with:

docker build -t memgraph_rust .

7. Now, you can start the application with the following command:

docker run memgraph_rust

You should see an output similar to the following:

Columns: u, m
(:User {'name': 'Alice'})
(:Software {'name': 'Memgraph'})

Where to next?

For real-world examples of how to use Memgraph, we suggest you take a look at the Tutorials page. You can also browse through the Database functionalities section to get an overview of all the functionalities Memgraph offers.