From 2660cfa97ca76d60a1c3c03c495716ccbac07fab Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: "ajeffrey@roblox.com" <ajeffrey@roblox.com>
Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2021 14:22:25 -0500
Subject: [PATCH] Add first draft of rfcs/unsealed-table-assign-indexer.md

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+# Unsealed table assignment creates an indexer
+
+In Luau, tables have a state, which can, among others, be "unsealed".
+An unsealed table is one that we are still constructing.  Currently
+assigning a table literal to an unsealed table creates new properties,
+but this is a problem in cases where tables are being used as hash
+tables.  We would like to change this so that assigning a table
+literal to an unsealed table creates an indexer rather than
+properties.
+
+## Motivation
+
+In lua-apps, there is testing code which (simplified) looks like:
+
+```lua
+local t = { u = {} }
+t = { u = { p = 37 } }
+t = { u = { q = 5 } }
+local x: number? = t.u["p"]
+local y: number? = t.u["q"]
+```
+
+Currently, this code doesn't typecheck, due to `p` and `q` being unknown properties of `t`.
+
+In order to support this idiom, we propose that assigning a table with
+properties of type `T` to to an unsealed table with no properties
+should introduce a string indexer of type `T`.
+
+For example, with this change the type of `t` is `{ u: { [string]: number } }`.
+
+## Drawbacks
+
+Currently table literals are sealed tables, so support width subtyping, which causes
+the system to be unsound, for example:
+
+```lua
+local t = { u = {} }
+local u : { p = 37 } = { p = 37, q = "hi" }
+t = { u = u }
+local x: number? = t.u["p"]
+local y: number? = t.u["q"] -- This is "hi" at run-time
+```
+
+The fix for this would be for table literals to be unsealed tables, and to only introduce an indexer when the subtype is unsealed.
+
+This fix needs a change to lua-apps, since sometimes the code uses
+assignment with a table literal to add properties, and sometimes to
+initialize a hash table. The code currently in lua-apps looks like:
+
+```lua
+local t = { } -- Note: no u property
+t = { u = { p = 37 } }
+t = { u = { q = 5 } }
+local x: number? = t.u["p"]
+local y: number? = t.u["q"]
+```
+
+## Alternatives
+
+Rather than introducing an indexer, we could introduce optional properties. For example we could infer the type of 
+`t` as `{ u: { p: number?, q: number? } }`.
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