The basic problem with C++ is that it has has hiding without safety. C has neither, and most newer languages have both. Attempts to add safety to C++ via templates always seem to leak raw pointers, since many APIs never converted to C++. It's significant that there isn't a C++ Linux kernel API, where you use C++ strings for everything and get rid of the null-terminated stuff.

You see this in the original poster's example. He's doing C-type I/O in C++. Of course it doesn't work cleanly.

It's frustrating. C++ is object-oriented. The cool kids don't like that. So, Rust isn't object-oriented; it uses traits and generics. Those are different enough that there is no one-to-one way to convert modern C++ into safe Rust. It takes a redesign.

So we're kind of stuck.

If you're familiar with game engines, consider what it would take to convert Unreal Engine to Rust.