oxidized library

Defines types similar to those in Rust, such as Result and Option.

Option

Type Option<T> represents an optional value, either Some and its value, or None which does not have a value. The Option<T> primarily serves as an alternative to nullable values, the benefit being that this type requires you to explicitly deal with the optional nature of the value.

Example

Borrowing from the Rust API documentation, the function below performs numeric division, returning a None if the denominator is zero.

Option<num> divide(num numerator, num denominator) {
  if (denominator == 0.0) {
    return None();
  } else {
    return Some(numerator / denominator);
  }
}

divide(10, 0).when(
  some: (v) {
    print(v);
  },
  none: () {
    print('oops');
  },
);

Result

The Result<T, E> type is intended for representing either a value, or an error. Typical use would be for functions that perform input/output operations that may result in a failure that is expected and recoverable (i.e. the behavior is not "exceptional", thus the code does not throw an exception). Using Result<T, E> encourages taking a direct approach to dealing with the result, without worrying about forgetting to catch all possible exceptions.

Example

Again, borrowing from the Rust API documentation, the function below parses some simple input and returns the result.

enum Version { version1, version2 }

Result<Version, Exception> parse_version(List<int> header) {
  switch (header[0]) {
    case 0:
      return Err(Exception('invalid header length'));
    case 1:
      return Ok(Version.version1);
    case 2:
      return Ok(Version.version2);
    default:
      return Err(Exception('invalid version'));
  }
}

void main() {
  final version = parse_version([1, 2, 3, 4]);
  version.when(
    ok: (v) {
      print('working with version: ${v}');
    },
    err: (e) {
      print('error parsing header: ${e}');
    },
  );
}

Unit

Similar to the Rust () type, the Unit type has exactly one value (), and is used when there is no other meaningful value that could be returned. This is especially useful for Result when not returning anything other than an error, as returning void in Dart is difficult with type parameterization.

The single instance of Unit is defined as the unit constant in the package.

Classes

Err<T, E>
An Err<T, E> is a Result that represents a failure.
None<T>
Type None<T> is an Option that does not contain any value.
Ok<T, E>
An Ok<T, E> is a Result that represents the successful value.
Option<T>
Option is a type that represents either some value (Some) or none (None).
Result<T, E>
Result is a type that represents either success (Ok) or failure (Err).
Some<T>
Type Some<T> is an Option that contains a value.
Unit
The Unit type has exactly one value (), and is used when there is no other meaningful value that could be returned for a Result.

Constants

unit → const Unit
The one instance of Unit.