On Wed, 23 Jun 2010 00:30:40 +0200, Ali Çehreli <acehreli@yahoo.com> wrote:

> dcoder wrote:
>
>  > So, I moved the initialization to inside the main function, and now it works.
>  > Great.  I think we need to put this question in the FAQ.
>
> For future reference, if it really needs to be global:
>
> uint[string] mywords;
>
> static this()
> {
>      mywords = [ "Hello" : 1, "World" : 1, "Cat" : 1, "Dog" : 1 ];
> }
>
> Ali



from what I have read in TDPL so far (about half way now), there is no mention of this limitation.
It just says that [key:value] is how you would statically initialize a AA.

Does this mean that it is just a D implementation issue. To me its seems like this should be a defined part
of the language. Also the compiler should really rewrite it to your above code anyway, surely?

-Rory

Bernard Helyer Wrote:

> On Wed, 23 Jun 2010 00:41:45 -0700, Ali Çehreli wrote:
> 
> > Ali Çehreli wrote:
> >> dcoder wrote:
> >> 
> >>  > So, I moved the initialization to inside the main function, and now
> >> it works.
> >>  > Great.  I think we need to put this question in the FAQ.
> >> 
> >> For future reference, if it really needs to be global:
> >> 
> >> uint[string] mywords;
> >> 
> >> static this()
> >> {
> >>     mywords = [ "Hello" : 1, "World" : 1, "Cat" : 1, "Dog" : 1 ];
> >> }
> > 
> > Could someone please verify whether the above is really necessary? Is it actually a dmd bug that we need to use 'static this()' to initialize an associative array?
> > 
> > Ali
> 
> I can't remember where exactly I read it, but there's a line in the docs specifically forbidding the use of AAs in constant expressions, so it's by design AFAIK.

http://www.digitalmars.com/d/2.0/expression.html#ArrayLiteral

"Associative array literals are a comma-separated list of key:value pairs... *An AssocArrayLiteral cannot be used to statically initialize anything. *"

Andrej Mitrovic Wrote:

> Bernard Helyer Wrote:
> 
> > On Wed, 23 Jun 2010 00:41:45 -0700, Ali Çehreli wrote:
> > 
> > > Ali Çehreli wrote:
> > >> dcoder wrote:
> > >> 
> > >>  > So, I moved the initialization to inside the main function, and now
> > >> it works.
> > >>  > Great.  I think we need to put this question in the FAQ.
> > >> 
> > >> For future reference, if it really needs to be global:
> > >> 
> > >> uint[string] mywords;
> > >> 
> > >> static this()
> > >> {
> > >>     mywords = [ "Hello" : 1, "World" : 1, "Cat" : 1, "Dog" : 1 ];
> > >> }
> > > 
> > > Could someone please verify whether the above is really necessary? Is it actually a dmd bug that we need to use 'static this()' to initialize an associative array?
> > > 
> > > Ali
> > 
> > I can't remember where exactly I read it, but there's a line in the docs specifically forbidding the use of AAs in constant expressions, so it's by design AFAIK.
> 
> http://www.digitalmars.com/d/2.0/expression.html#ArrayLiteral
> 
> "Associative array literals are a comma-separated list of key:value pairs... *An AssocArrayLiteral cannot be used to statically initialize anything. *"

Woops, correct link: http://www.digitalmars.com/d/2.0/expression.html#AssocArrayLiteral