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Add methods to leak RefCell borrows to references
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Usually, references to the interior are only created by the `Deref` and
`DerefMut` impl of the guards `Ref` and `RefMut`. Note that `RefCell`
already has to cope with leaks of such guards which, when it occurs,
effectively makes it impossible to ever acquire a mutable guard or any
guard for `Ref` and `RefMut` respectively. It is already safe to use
this to create a reference to the inner of the ref cell that lives as
long as the reference to the `RefCell` itself, e.g.

```rust
fn leak(r: &RefCell<usize>) -> Option<&usize> {
    let guard = r.try_borrow().ok()?;
    let leaked = Box::leak(Box::new(guard));
    Some(&*leaked)
}
```

The newly added methods allow the same reference conversion without an
indirection over a leaked allocation and composing with both borrow and
try_borrow without additional method combinations.
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HeroicKatora committed Jan 31, 2020
1 parent 698fcd3 commit 14999dd
Showing 1 changed file with 63 additions and 0 deletions.
63 changes: 63 additions & 0 deletions src/libcore/cell.rs
Expand Up @@ -1245,6 +1245,38 @@ impl<'b, T: ?Sized> Ref<'b, T> {
let borrow = orig.borrow.clone();
(Ref { value: a, borrow }, Ref { value: b, borrow: orig.borrow })
}

/// Convert into a reference to the underlying data.
///
/// The underlying `RefCell` can never be mutably borrowed from again and will always appear
/// already immutably borrowed. It can still be immutably borrowed until more than `isize::MAX`
/// `Ref`s of this `RefCell` have been leaked, through this function or another leak, in total.
///
/// This is an associated function that needs to be used as
/// `Ref::leak(...)`. A method would interfere with methods of the
/// same name on the contents of a `RefCell` used through `Deref`.
///
/// # Examples
///
/// ```
/// #![feature(cell_leak)]
/// use std::cell::{RefCell, Ref};
/// let cell = RefCell::new(0);
///
/// let value = Ref::leak(cell.borrow());
/// assert_eq!(*value, 0);
///
/// assert!(cell.try_borrow().is_ok());
/// assert!(cell.try_borrow_mut().is_err());
/// ```
#[unstable(feature = "cell_leak", issue = "none")]
pub fn leak(orig: Ref<'b, T>) -> &'b T {
// By forgetting this BorrowRefMut we ensure that the borrow counter in the RefCell never
// goes back to UNUSED again. No further references can be created from the original cell,
// making the current borrow the only reference for the remaining lifetime.
mem::forget(orig.borrow);
orig.value
}
}

#[unstable(feature = "coerce_unsized", issue = "27732")]
Expand Down Expand Up @@ -1330,6 +1362,37 @@ impl<'b, T: ?Sized> RefMut<'b, T> {
let borrow = orig.borrow.clone();
(RefMut { value: a, borrow }, RefMut { value: b, borrow: orig.borrow })
}

/// Convert into a mutable reference to the underlying data.
///
/// The underlying `RefCell` can not be borrowed from again and will always appear already
/// mutably borrowed, making the returned reference the only to the interior.
///
/// This is an associated function that needs to be used as
/// `RefMut::leak(...)`. A method would interfere with methods of the
/// same name on the contents of a `RefCell` used through `Deref`.
///
/// # Examples
///
/// ```
/// #![feature(cell_leak)]
/// use std::cell::{RefCell, RefMut};
/// let cell = RefCell::new(0);
///
/// let value = RefMut::leak(cell.borrow_mut());
/// assert_eq!(*value, 0);
/// *value = 1;
///
/// assert!(cell.try_borrow_mut().is_err());
/// ```
#[unstable(feature = "cell_leak", issue = "none")]
pub fn leak(orig: RefMut<'b, T>) -> &'b mut T {
// By forgetting this BorrowRefMut we ensure that the borrow counter in the RefCell never
// goes back to UNUSED again. No further references can be created from the original cell,
// making the current borrow the only reference for the remaining lifetime.
mem::forget(orig.borrow);
orig.value
}
}

struct BorrowRefMut<'b> {
Expand Down

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