Spurious dead code warning when item is only used in impls

[arielb1]

It seems that if a const is only used in impls, but not in actual code, then rustc emits a "constant item is never used" warning, as in the following code:

const TLC: uint = 4;
trait Tr { fn doit(&self); }
impl Tr for [uint, ..TLC] {
    fn doit(&self) { println!("called 4"); }
}

fn main() {
    let s = [0,1,2,3u];
    s.doit(); // which .doit is called depends on architecture
}

Which prints (when compiled and then run):

<anon>:1:1: 1:21 warning: constant item is never used: `TLC`, #[warn(dead_code)] on by default
<anon>:1 const TLC: uint = 4;
         ^~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
called 4

[steveklabnik]

Updated code:

const TLC: usize = 4;
trait Tr { fn doit(&self); }
impl Tr for [usize; TLC] {
    fn doit(&self) { println!("called 4"); }
}

fn main() {
    let s = [0,1,2,3];
    s.doit(); // which .doit is called depends on architecture
}

Still gives the warning.

[wthrowe]

Not particularly related to constants: impls just aren't counted as uses for types they refer to. Y and Z are both marked dead here:

struct X;
struct Y;
struct Z;

trait Foo<T> {
    type Ty;
    fn foo() -> Self::Ty;
}

impl Foo<Y> for X {
    type Ty = Z;
    fn foo() -> Self::Ty { unimplemented!() }
}

fn main() {
    X::foo();
}

[binarycrusader]

I hit another case with this just in the last few days using nightly via rustup; impls don't appear to be involved?

const ACT_STRINGS: &'static [&'static str] = &["set name=foo value=foo"];

#[cfg(test)]
mod tests {
    use super::*;

    #[test]
    fn parse() {
        for astr in ACT_STRINGS.iter() {
            println!("{}", astr);
        }
    }   
}

$ cargo --version
cargo 0.17.0-nightly (740f9c0 2016-12-29)
$ rustc --version
rustc 1.16.0-nightly (4ecc85beb 2016-12-28)
$ cargo build -v
   Compiling parser v0.1.0 (file:///builds/srwalker/rsdev/parser)
     Running `rustc --crate-name parser lib.rs --crate-type lib -g -C metadata=be6ddb31ceb06482 -C extra-filename=-be6ddb31ceb06482 --out-dir /builds/srwalker/rsdev/parser/target/debug/deps --emit=dep-info,link -L dependency=/builds/srwalker/rsdev/parser/target/debug/deps`
warning: constant item is never used: `ACT_STRINGS`, #[warn(dead_code)] on by default
 --> lib.rs:1:1
  |
1 | const ACT_STRINGS: &'static [&'static str] = &["set name=foo value=foo"];
  | ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

    Finished debug [unoptimized + debuginfo] target(s) in 0.6 secs

Changing the use super::*; into use super::ACT_STRINGS; makes no difference.

I suspect my case is issue #33166 ?

[Mark-Simulacrum]

Triage:

• Original error reproduces.
• This example reproduces.
• This example seems unrelated, more due to test code being #[cfg(test)] (so really unused).

[Mark-Simulacrum]

Self needs to be examined as well: #30029.