Explain ownership in Rust.

Summary

Every value has a single owner; when the owner goes out of scope the value is dropped. Assigning or passing a non-Copy value moves ownership, so the old binding can't be used, which prevents double frees and use-after-free without a garbage collector.

Longer Answer

Copy types (integers, floats, bool, char) are duplicated instead of moved. clone() makes explicit deep copies. Borrowing (&T, &mut T) lets code use a value without taking ownership.

Key Points

• One owner; dropped at end of scope.
• Moves for heap types; Copy for simple ones.
• Borrowing avoids moves.

Deep dive: Rust Fundamentals: Ownership