language feature: native methods

[sanderr]

Description

Add native methods to the language. They have a return value and can be called explicitly (unlike implementations).

entity Int:
    int n
    bool even = self.is_even()
end

method is_even: bool for Int:
    return self.n % 2 == 0  # 1 return statement per method, conventionally lexically last in the block but not strictly required
end

Open questions

• I only have a vague recollection of wishing for something like this -> come up with a concrete use case. Perhaps only really useful in conjunction with language feature: protocols / traits #7116 and/or language feature: generics #7114.
• syntax: declaration: return statement, return type annotation, ...
• should methods be functional? i.e. side effect free with respect to the model? Makes promise tracking a lot easier
• should we offer non-method functions?
• should methods be able to have arguments?
• where can methods be called? e.g. can they be called as a default in entity definitions?
• Can methods be overridden? Can overriding method call parent?

[wouterdb]

I think the bigger change in the example is having a default that is a full dyamic expression.

Everything else could be defined as syntactic sugar on top of existing things?

entity Method:

end

Method.self [1] -- SelfType

Method(self=myself)

implement Method using implementation_for_it

[sanderr]

Interesting suggestion, definitely worth consideration.

[bartv]

I am not entirely sure yet how useful this is and why it is better than:

entity Int:
    int n
    bool even
end

implementation is_even for Int:
    self.even = self.n % 2 == 0 
end

However, there is a pattern that we use more often for which this is a start of an improvement. We often "abuse" entity to calculate certain values, often more than one. Something like:

entity Test:
  string a
  string b
  string c
  string d
  string e
end

implementation x for Test:
  self.d = ... # both use a, b, c to calculate d and e
  self.e = ...
end

In this case a, b and c are the argument and d and e are the return values. I see two main options for this:

• have the ability to return entities for methods. This then also raises the question: do we need methods or wouldn't functions be much more useful. Something like a plugin call, but defined in the language
• Introduce a concept of in and out parameters. It seems that some database have this in stored procedures and in the swift language of apple