Fake global associative array literals

[sergk]

On Fri, Oct 28, 2011 at 5:53 PM, bearophile <bearophileHUGS at lycos.com> wrote:
> What do you think about a rewrite rule that changes code like:
>
> int[int] aa = [1:2, 3:4];
> void main() {}
>
>
> Into:
>
> int[int] aa;
> static this() {
>    aa = [1:2, 3:4];
> }
> void main() {}

Its not quite same case, but still could be useful - what I usually do
if I need global or static immutable AA behavior:

int f_aa(int key)
{
    switch (key) {
    case 1: return 2;
    case 3: return 4;
    default: return int.init;
    }
}

void main()
{
    // f_aa == [1:2, 3:4]
    static assert (f_aa(1) == 2);
    static assert (f_aa(3) == 4);
}


For immutable data or CTFE I cannot see other way to get AA-like data.
The function itself could be generated on compile-time as string
mixin, but I usually don't bother.


-- 
serg.