Revise OOP section for maps.

This commit is contained in:
Stephen Chung 2020-06-26 19:32:06 +08:00
parent 175c3ccaec
commit 14746f94ca

View File

@ -6,18 +6,31 @@ Special Support for OOP via Object Maps
[Object maps] can be used to simulate object-oriented programming ([OOP]) by storing data
as properties and methods as properties holding [function pointers].
If an [object map]'s property holding a [function pointer] is called in method-call style,
it calls the function referenced by the [function pointer].
If an [object map]'s property holds a [function pointer], the property can simply be called like
a normal method in method-call syntax. This is a _short-hand_ to avoid the more verbose syntax
of using the `call` function keyword.
When a property holding a [function pointer] is called like a method, what happens next depends
on whether the target function is a native Rust function or a script-defined function.
If it is a registered native Rust method function, then it is called directly.
If it is a script-defined function, the `this` variable within the function body is bound
to the [object map] before the function is called. There is no way to simulate this behavior
via a normal function-call syntax because all scripted function arguments are passed by value.
```rust
fn do_action(x) { print(this + x); } // 'this' binds to the object when called
fn do_action(x) { print(this.data + x); } // 'this' binds to the object when called
let obj = #{
data: 40,
action: Fn("do_action") // 'action' holds a function pointer to 'do_action'
};
obj.action(2); // prints 42
obj.action(2); // Short-hand syntax: prints 42
obj.action.call(2); // <- the above de-sugars to this
// To achieve the above with normal function pointer calls:
fn do_action(map, x) { print(map.data + x); }
obj.action.call(obj, 2); // this call cannot mutate 'obj'
```