Merge pull request #6405 from dotty-staging/try-contextual-repr

Trial: rename implied-for to repr-of

Author: odersky

docs/docs/reference/contextual-repr/context-bounds.md

@@ -0,0 +1,30 @@
+---
+layout: doc-page
+title: "Context Bounds"
+---
+
+## Context Bounds
+
+A context bound is a shorthand for expressing a common pattern of an implicit parameter that depends on a type parameter. Using a context bound, the `maximum` function of the last section can be written like this:
+```scala
+def maximum[T: Ord](xs: List[T]): T = xs.reduceLeft(max)
+```
+A bound like `: Ord` on a type parameter `T` of a method or class is equivalent to a given clause `given Ord[T]`. The implicit parameter(s) generated from context bounds come last in the definition of the containing method or class. E.g.,
+```scala
+def f[T: C1 : C2, U: C3](x: T) given (y: U, z: V): R
+```
+would expand to
+```scala
+def f[T, U](x: T) given (y: U, z: V) given C1[T], C2[T], C3[U]: R
+```
+Context bounds can be combined with subtype bounds. If both are present, subtype bounds come first, e.g.
+```scala
+def g[T <: B : C](x: T): R = ...
+```
+
+## Syntax
+
+```
+TypeParamBounds   ::=  [SubtypeBounds] {ContextBound}
+ContextBound      ::=  ‘:’ Type
+```

docs/docs/reference/contextual-repr/conversions.md

@@ -0,0 +1,75 @@
+---
+layout: doc-page
+title: "Implicit Conversions"
+---
+
+Implicit conversions are defined by representatives of the `scala.Conversion` class.
+This class is defined in package `scala` as follows:
+```scala
+abstract class Conversion[-T, +U] extends (T => U)
+```
+For example, here is an implicit conversion from `String` to `Token`:
+```scala
+repr of Conversion[String, Token] {
+  def apply(str: String): Token = new KeyWord(str)
+}
+```
+Using an alias representative this can be expressed more concisely as:
+```scala
+repr of Conversion[String, Token] = new KeyWord(_)
+```
+An implicit conversion is applied automatically by the compiler in three situations:
+
+1. If an expression `e` has type `T`, and `T` does not conform to the expression's expected type `S`.
+2. In a selection `e.m` with `e` of type `T`, but `T` defines no member `m`.
+3. In an application `e.m(args)` with `e` of type `T`, if `T` does define
+   some member(s) named `m`, but none of these members can be applied to the arguments `args`.
+
+In the first case, the compiler looks for a representative of
+`scala.Conversion` that maps an argument of type `T` to type `S`. In the second and third
+case, it looks for a representative of `scala.Conversion` that maps an argument of type `T`
+to a type that defines a member `m` which can be applied to `args` if present.
+If such a representative `C` is found, the expression `e` is replaced by `C.apply(e)`.
+
+## Examples
+
+1. The `Predef` package contains "auto-boxing" conversions that map
+primitive number types to subclasses of `java.lang.Number`. For instance, the
+conversion from `Int` to `java.lang.Integer` can be defined as follows:
+```scala
+repr int2Integer of Conversion[Int, java.lang.Integer] =
+ java.lang.Integer.valueOf(_)
+```
+
+2. The "magnet" pattern is sometimes used to express many variants of a method. Instead of defining overloaded versions of the method, one can also let the method take one or more arguments of specially defined "magnet" types, into which various argument types can be converted. E.g.
+```scala
+object Completions {
+
+  // The argument "magnet" type
+  enum CompletionArg {
+    case Error(s: String)
+    case Response(f: Future[HttpResponse])
+    case Status(code: Future[StatusCode])
+  }
+  object CompletionArg {
+
+    // conversions defining the possible arguments to pass to `complete`
+    // these always come with CompletionArg
+    // They can be invoked explicitly, e.g.
+    //
+    //   CompletionArg.fromStatusCode(statusCode)
+
+    repr fromString     of Conversion[String, CompletionArg]               = Error(_)
+    repr fromFuture     of Conversion[Future[HttpResponse], CompletionArg] = Response(_)
+    repr fromStatusCode of Conversion[Future[StatusCode], CompletionArg]   = Status(_)
+  }
+  import CompletionArg._
+
+  def complete[T](arg: CompletionArg) = arg match {
+    case Error(s) => ...
+    case Response(f) => ...
+    case Status(code) => ...
+  }
+}
+```
+This setup is more complicated than simple overloading of `complete`, but it can still be useful if normal overloading is not available (as in the case above, since we cannot have two overloaded methods that take `Future[...]` arguments), or if normal overloading would lead to a combinatorial explosion of variants.