From 359ece4d279dae27c79c0f2f57566a6754557260 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Remo Senekowitsch <remo@buenzli.dev>
Date: Mon, 21 Sep 2026 15:46:38 +0200
Subject: [PATCH 1/3] fix parsing of cargo locate-project output

Deserializing the output of `cargo locate-project --workspace` failed
for a windows user, with the error message from serde that `root` is a
string and not a path. Hopefully, using a string directly will also
work on Windows.
---
 src/init.rs | 4 ++--
 1 file changed, 2 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/src/init.rs b/src/init.rs
index 3ccef756d8..cc6d855280 100644
--- a/src/init.rs
+++ b/src/init.rs
@@ -20,7 +20,7 @@ use crate::{
 #[derive(Deserialize)]
 struct CargoLocateProject<'a> {
     #[serde(borrow)]
-    root: &'a Path,
+    root: &'a str,
 }
 
 pub fn init() -> Result<()> {
@@ -74,7 +74,7 @@ pub fn init() -> Result<()> {
                 .root;
 
         let workspace_manifest_content = fs::read_to_string(workspace_manifest)
-            .with_context(|| format!("Failed to read the file {}", workspace_manifest.display()))?;
+            .with_context(|| format!("Failed to read the file {}", workspace_manifest))?;
         if !workspace_manifest_content.contains("[workspace]")
             && !workspace_manifest_content.contains("workspace.")
         {

From cf3a66fe5e796fb3592ecce5d8ad00925ffbec08 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Remo Senekowitsch <remo@buenzli.dev>
Date: Mon, 21 Sep 2026 16:34:34 +0200
Subject: [PATCH 2/3] use --message-format=plain for `cargo locate-project`

This avoids the deserialization step.
---
 src/init.rs | 24 +++++++++---------------
 1 file changed, 9 insertions(+), 15 deletions(-)

diff --git a/src/init.rs b/src/init.rs
index cc6d855280..683d5c090e 100644
--- a/src/init.rs
+++ b/src/init.rs
@@ -3,7 +3,6 @@ use crossterm::{
     QueueableCommand,
     style::{Attribute, Color, ResetColor, SetAttribute, SetForegroundColor},
 };
-use serde::Deserialize;
 use std::{
     env::{current_dir, set_current_dir},
     fs::{self, create_dir},
@@ -17,12 +16,6 @@ use crate::{
     info_file::InfoFile, term::press_enter_prompt,
 };
 
-#[derive(Deserialize)]
-struct CargoLocateProject<'a> {
-    #[serde(borrow)]
-    root: &'a str,
-}
-
 pub fn init() -> Result<()> {
     let rustlings_dir = Path::new("rustlings");
     if rustlings_dir.exists() {
@@ -33,6 +26,7 @@ pub fn init() -> Result<()> {
         .arg("locate-project")
         .arg("-q")
         .arg("--workspace")
+        .arg("--message-format=plain")
         .stdin(Stdio::null())
         .stderr(Stdio::null())
         .output()
@@ -66,15 +60,15 @@ pub fn init() -> Result<()> {
             bail!(IN_INITIALIZED_DIR_ERR);
         }
 
-        let workspace_manifest =
-            serde_json::de::from_slice::<CargoLocateProject>(&locate_project_output.stdout)
-                .context(
-                    "Failed to read the field `root` from the output of `cargo locate-project …`",
-                )?
-                .root;
+        let workspace_manifest = {
+            let mut stdout = String::try_from(locate_project_output.stdout)
+                .context("Failed to convert the output of `cargo locate-project …` to a string")?;
+            stdout.truncate(stdout.trim_end().len()); // trim trailing newline
+            stdout
+        };
 
-        let workspace_manifest_content = fs::read_to_string(workspace_manifest)
-            .with_context(|| format!("Failed to read the file {}", workspace_manifest))?;
+        let workspace_manifest_content = fs::read_to_string(&workspace_manifest)
+            .with_context(|| format!("Failed to read the file {workspace_manifest}"))?;
         if !workspace_manifest_content.contains("[workspace]")
             && !workspace_manifest_content.contains("workspace.")
         {

From b677a2c20f602a40ab476dad1aa8c9c3bcd5c3c1 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Remo Senekowitsch <remo@buenzli.dev>
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 2026 12:12:15 +0200
Subject: [PATCH 3/3] parse command output consistently

---
 src/init.rs | 13 ++++++-------
 1 file changed, 6 insertions(+), 7 deletions(-)

diff --git a/src/init.rs b/src/init.rs
index 683d5c090e..139e922763 100644
--- a/src/init.rs
+++ b/src/init.rs
@@ -22,7 +22,7 @@ pub fn init() -> Result<()> {
         bail!(RUSTLINGS_DIR_ALREADY_EXISTS_ERR);
     }
 
-    let locate_project_output = Command::new("cargo")
+    let mut locate_project_output = Command::new("cargo")
         .arg("locate-project")
         .arg("-q")
         .arg("--workspace")
@@ -60,12 +60,11 @@ pub fn init() -> Result<()> {
             bail!(IN_INITIALIZED_DIR_ERR);
         }
 
-        let workspace_manifest = {
-            let mut stdout = String::try_from(locate_project_output.stdout)
-                .context("Failed to convert the output of `cargo locate-project …` to a string")?;
-            stdout.truncate(stdout.trim_end().len()); // trim trailing newline
-            stdout
-        };
+        // Remove newline
+        locate_project_output.stdout.pop();
+
+        let workspace_manifest = String::try_from(locate_project_output.stdout)
+            .context("Failed to convert the output of `cargo locate-project …` to a string")?;
 
         let workspace_manifest_content = fs::read_to_string(&workspace_manifest)
             .with_context(|| format!("Failed to read the file {workspace_manifest}"))?;