nixpkgs/lib/fixed-points.nix
Silvan Mosberger b82c1c7b5c lib.fix: Improve doc more
Done together in and after the docs team meeting

Co-Authored-By: Robert Hensing <robert@roberthensing.nl>
2023-10-12 17:38:00 +02:00

198 lines
6.3 KiB
Nix

{ lib, ... }:
rec {
/*
`fix f` computes the fixed point of the given function `f`. In other words, the return value is `x` in `x = f x`.
`f` must be a lazy function.
This means that `x` must be a value that can be partially evaluated,
such as an attribute set, a list, or a function.
This way, `f` can use one part of `x` to compute another part.
**Relation to syntactic recursion**
This section explains `fix` by refactoring from syntactic recursion to a call of `fix` instead.
For context, Nix lets you define attributes in terms of other attributes syntactically using the [`rec { }` syntax](https://nixos.org/manual/nix/stable/language/constructs.html#recursive-sets).
```nix
nix-repl> rec {
foo = "foo";
bar = "bar";
foobar = foo + bar;
}
{ bar = "bar"; foo = "foo"; foobar = "foobar"; }
```
This is convenient when constructing a value to pass to a function for example,
but an equivalent effect can be achieved with the `let` binding syntax:
```nix
nix-repl> let self = {
foo = "foo";
bar = "bar";
foobar = self.foo + self.bar;
}; in self
{ bar = "bar"; foo = "foo"; foobar = "foobar"; }
```
But in general you can get more reuse out of `let` bindings by refactoring them to a function.
```nix
nix-repl> f = self: {
foo = "foo";
bar = "bar";
foobar = self.foo + self.bar;
}
```
This is where `fix` comes in, it contains the syntactic that's not in `f` anymore.
```nix
nix-repl> fix = f:
let self = f self; in self;
```
By applying `fix` we get the final result.
```nix
nix-repl> fix f
{ bar = "bar"; foo = "foo"; foobar = "foobar"; }
```
Such a refactored `f` using `fix` is not useful by itself.
See [`extends`](#function-library-lib.fixedPoints.extends) for an example use case.
There `self` is also often called `final`.
Type: fix :: (a -> a) -> a
Example:
fix (self: { foo = "foo"; bar = "bar"; foobar = self.foo + self.bar; })
=> { bar = "bar"; foo = "foo"; foobar = "foobar"; }
fix (self: [ 1 2 (elemAt self 0 + elemAt self 1) ])
=> [ 1 2 3 ]
*/
fix = f: let x = f x; in x;
/*
A variant of `fix` that records the original recursive attribute set in the
result, in an attribute named `__unfix__`.
This is useful in combination with the `extends` function to
implement deep overriding.
*/
fix' = f: let x = f x // { __unfix__ = f; }; in x;
/*
Return the fixpoint that `f` converges to when called iteratively, starting
with the input `x`.
```
nix-repl> converge (x: x / 2) 16
0
```
Type: (a -> a) -> a -> a
*/
converge = f: x:
let
x' = f x;
in
if x' == x
then x
else converge f x';
/*
Modify the contents of an explicitly recursive attribute set in a way that
honors `self`-references. This is accomplished with a function
```nix
g = self: super: { foo = super.foo + " + "; }
```
that has access to the unmodified input (`super`) as well as the final
non-recursive representation of the attribute set (`self`). `extends`
differs from the native `//` operator insofar as that it's applied *before*
references to `self` are resolved:
```
nix-repl> fix (extends g f)
{ bar = "bar"; foo = "foo + "; foobar = "foo + bar"; }
```
The name of the function is inspired by object-oriented inheritance, i.e.
think of it as an infix operator `g extends f` that mimics the syntax from
Java. It may seem counter-intuitive to have the "base class" as the second
argument, but it's nice this way if several uses of `extends` are cascaded.
To get a better understanding how `extends` turns a function with a fix
point (the package set we start with) into a new function with a different fix
point (the desired packages set) lets just see, how `extends g f`
unfolds with `g` and `f` defined above:
```
extends g f = self: let super = f self; in super // g self super;
= self: let super = { foo = "foo"; bar = "bar"; foobar = self.foo + self.bar; }; in super // g self super
= self: { foo = "foo"; bar = "bar"; foobar = self.foo + self.bar; } // g self { foo = "foo"; bar = "bar"; foobar = self.foo + self.bar; }
= self: { foo = "foo"; bar = "bar"; foobar = self.foo + self.bar; } // { foo = "foo" + " + "; }
= self: { foo = "foo + "; bar = "bar"; foobar = self.foo + self.bar; }
```
*/
extends = f: rattrs: self: let super = rattrs self; in super // f self super;
/*
Compose two extending functions of the type expected by 'extends'
into one where changes made in the first are available in the
'super' of the second
*/
composeExtensions =
f: g: final: prev:
let fApplied = f final prev;
prev' = prev // fApplied;
in fApplied // g final prev';
/*
Compose several extending functions of the type expected by 'extends' into
one where changes made in preceding functions are made available to
subsequent ones.
```
composeManyExtensions : [packageSet -> packageSet -> packageSet] -> packageSet -> packageSet -> packageSet
^final ^prev ^overrides ^final ^prev ^overrides
```
*/
composeManyExtensions =
lib.foldr (x: y: composeExtensions x y) (final: prev: {});
/*
Create an overridable, recursive attribute set. For example:
```
nix-repl> obj = makeExtensible (self: { })
nix-repl> obj
{ __unfix__ = «lambda»; extend = «lambda»; }
nix-repl> obj = obj.extend (self: super: { foo = "foo"; })
nix-repl> obj
{ __unfix__ = «lambda»; extend = «lambda»; foo = "foo"; }
nix-repl> obj = obj.extend (self: super: { foo = super.foo + " + "; bar = "bar"; foobar = self.foo + self.bar; })
nix-repl> obj
{ __unfix__ = «lambda»; bar = "bar"; extend = «lambda»; foo = "foo + "; foobar = "foo + bar"; }
```
*/
makeExtensible = makeExtensibleWithCustomName "extend";
/*
Same as `makeExtensible` but the name of the extending attribute is
customized.
*/
makeExtensibleWithCustomName = extenderName: rattrs:
fix' (self: (rattrs self) // {
${extenderName} = f: makeExtensibleWithCustomName extenderName (extends f rattrs);
});
}