["A";"B";;"C";"D"] works in v1.7.2 but gives an error in v1.7.3

[jonaswickman]

In julia v1.7.2 you can write

["A";"B";;"C";"D"]

which gives you a matrix:

2×2 Matrix{String}:
 "A"  "C"
 "B"  "D"

In version 1.7.3 however you get an error message:

ERROR: MethodError: no method matching size(::String, ::Int64)
Closest candidates are:
  size(::Union{LinearAlgebra.QR, LinearAlgebra.QRCompactWY, LinearAlgebra.QRPivoted}, ::Integer) at ~/Files/Programs/Julia/julia-1.7.3/share/julia/stdlib/v1.7/LinearAlgebra/src/qr.jl:566
  size(::Union{LinearAlgebra.Hermitian{T, S}, LinearAlgebra.Symmetric{T, S}} where {T, S}, ::Any) at ~/Files/Programs/Julia/julia-1.7.3/share/julia/stdlib/v1.7/LinearAlgebra/src/symmetric.jl:201
  size(::Union{LinearAlgebra.Cholesky, LinearAlgebra.CholeskyPivoted}, ::Integer) at ~/Files/Programs/Julia/julia-1.7.3/share/julia/stdlib/v1.7/LinearAlgebra/src/cholesky.jl:495
  ...
Stacktrace:
 [1] _typed_hvncat_dims(#unused#::Type{String}, dims::Tuple{Int64, Int64}, row_first::Bool, as::NTuple{4, String})
   @ Base ./abstractarray.jl:2328
 [2] _typed_hvncat(::Type, ::Tuple{Int64, Int64}, ::Bool, ::String, ::Vararg{String})
   @ Base ./abstractarray.jl:2304
 [3] _hvncat(::Tuple{Int64, Int64}, ::Bool, ::String, ::Vararg{String})
   @ Base ./abstractarray.jl:2133
 [4] hvncat(::Tuple{Int64, Int64}, ::Bool, ::String, ::Vararg{String})
   @ Base ./abstractarray.jl:2129
 [5] top-level scope
   @ REPL[2]:1

Full version info for both versions:

Julia Version 1.7.2
Commit bf53498635 (2022-02-06 15:21 UTC)
Platform Info:
  OS: Linux (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)
  CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-10750H CPU @ 2.60GHz
  WORD_SIZE: 64
  LIBM: libopenlibm
  LLVM: libLLVM-12.0.1 (ORCJIT, skylake)

Julia Version 1.7.3
Commit 742b9abb4d (2022-05-06 12:58 UTC)
Platform Info:
  OS: Linux (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)
  CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-10750H CPU @ 2.60GHz
  WORD_SIZE: 64
  LIBM: libopenlibm
  LLVM: libLLVM-12.0.1 (ORCJIT, skylake)

[jmkuhn]

Need to backport #45365.

[giordano]

Duplicate of #45461?

[BioTurboNick]

As a workaround, you can define

Base.size(x::String, y::Int) = Base.cat_size(x, y)