On 2014-05-16, at 7:14, Daniel Micay <danielmi...@gmail.com> wrote: > On 16/05/14 12:10 AM, Tommi wrote: >> I was just wondering, why do we have to explicitly specify the lifetimes of >> references returned from functions? Couldn't the compiler figure those >> lifetimes out by itself by analyzing the code in the function? > > Type inference is local to functions, so it couldn't do that. It would > be impossible to have libraries if inference needed to be global across > the entire program, and the errors would be *signicantly* harder to > understand as they would span across countless functions.
I'm sorry, but for some reason I completely fail to understand your explanation. My thinking of how the compiler would work is that whenever it compiles a function, it would analyze it and in some sense "write in" the named lifetimes for that function. The named lifetimes would still be explicitly part of the signature of the function in the compiler's internal representation of the function, but not be visible in the source code. _______________________________________________ Rust-dev mailing list Rust-dev@mozilla.org https://mail.mozilla.org/listinfo/rust-dev
