[front end] Rework null shorting to use shared infrastructure.

Rework the implementation of null shorting in the front end to make
use of the shared infrastructure implemented in
https://dart-review.googlesource.com/c/sdk/+/399480.

The shared infrastructure keeps track of null-aware guards on a stack
(owned by `NullShortingMixin`), so the class
`NullAwareExpressionInferenceResult` is no longer necessary. And the
plumbing that used to be necessary to pass around linked lists of
null-aware guards is no longer needed. Also, several members of
`ExpressionInferenceResult` are no longer needed (`nullAwareGuards`,
`nullAwareAction`, `nullAwareActionType`, and `stopShorting`).

Some code remains in the front end but had to be moved:

- The logic to promote the synthetic temporary variable to
  non-nullable was moved from the `NullAwareGuard` constructor to
  `InferenceVisitorImpl.createNullAwareGuard`. This was necessary to
  ensure that the promotions are done in the correct order (first the
  shared method `startNullShorting` promotes the expression to the
  left of the `?.`, and then
  `InferenceVisitorImpl.createNullAwareGuard` promotes the synthetic
  temporary variable).

- The logic for desugaring a null-aware cascade expression is now
  implemented directly in `visitCascade`, rather than taking advantage
  of the shared infrastructure for null shorting. The rationale for
  this is twofold:

  - Null-aware cascades don't fully participate in null-shorting,
    because cascade sections are greedily parsed, so it’s impossible
    for a cascade section to be followed by any selectors that might
    continue the null shorting. So trying to re-use the shared null
    shorting infrastructure for cascade expressions would be overkill.

  - The way the front end lowers a null-aware cascade is not ideal
    (`x?..f()` is lowered to `let tmp = x in x == null ? null :
    BlockExpression({ tmp.f(); }, tmp)`, which has the disadvantage
    that it's not obvious to back-end optimization passes that the
    value of the cascade expression is equal to the value of the
    temporary variable). Keeping the logic for null-aware cascades
    separate from the logic for null shorting will make it easier to
    experiment with better lowerings in the future.

Also, since the front end doesn't always use the shared method
`analyzeExpression` for analyzing subexpressions, the shared logic for
null shorting in `analyzeExpression` was replicated in
`InferenceVisitorImpl.inferExpression`. In a future CL I would like to
change the front end to always use the shared method
`analyzeExpression` for analyzing subexpressions, so
`InferenceVisitorImpl.inferExpression` won't be needed.  But that's
not possible right now, because `InferenceVisitorImpl.inferExpression`
has behaviors that aren't implemented in the shared method
`analyzeExpression` yet (see the optional parameters `isVoidAllowed`
and `forEffect`).

Change-Id: I4d11e373bb87c3c51bcaf445880d1bffbb5c0b22
Reviewed-on: https://dart-review.googlesource.com/c/sdk/+/398120
Reviewed-by: Johnni Winther <johnniwinther@google.com>
Commit-Queue: Paul Berry <paulberry@google.com>

https://dart.googlesource.com/sdk/+/4e5144ac9b7b0907aa77c8f4fbb83d8fc8025e3f
2 files changed
tree: f19b7f507cdf1e4f79a7bc4fe10ef8251aacdbad
  1. ci/
  2. tools/
  3. .gitignore
  4. commits.json
  5. DEPS
  6. OWNERS
  7. README.md
README.md

Monorepo

A gclient solution for checking out Dart and Flutter source trees

Monorepo is:

  • Optimized for Tip-of-Tree testing: The Monorepo DEPS used to check out Dart and Flutter dependencies comes from the Flutter engine DEPS with updated dependencies from Dart.

Checking out Monorepo

With depot_tools installed and on your path, create a directory for your monorepo checkout and run these commands to create a gclient solution in that directory:

mkdir monorepo
cd monorepo
gclient config --unmanaged https://dart.googlesource.com/monorepo
gclient sync -D

This gives you a checkout in the monorepo directory that contains:

monorepo/
  DEPS - the DEPS used for this gclient checkout
  commits.json - the pinned commits for Dart, flutter/engine,
                 and flutter/flutter
  tools/ - scripts used to create monorepo DEPS
engine/src/ - the flutter/buildroot repo
    flutter/ - the flutter/engine repo
    out/ - the build directory, where Flutter engine builds are created
    third_party/ - Flutter dependencies checked out by DEPS
      dart/ - the Dart SDK checkout.
        third_party - Dart dependencies, also used by Flutter
flutter/ - the flutter/flutter repo

Building Flutter engine

Flutter's instructions for building the engine are at Compiling the engine

They can be followed closely, with a few changes:

  • Googlers working on Dart do not need to switch to Fuchsia's Goma RBE, except for Windows. The GOMA_DIR enviroment variable can just point to the .cipd_bin directory in a depot_tools installation, and just goma_ctl ensure_start is sufficient.
  • The --no-prebuilt-dart-sdk option has to be added to every gn command, so that the build is set up to build and use a local Dart SDK.
  • The --full-dart-sdk option must be added to gn for the host build target if you will be building web or desktop apps.

Example build commands that work on linux:

MONOREPO_PATH=$PWD
if [[ ! $PATH =~ (^|:)$MONOREPO_PATH/flutter/bin(:|$) ]]; then
  PATH=$MONOREPO_PATH/flutter/bin:$PATH
fi

export GOMA_DIR=$(dirname $(command -v gclient))/.cipd_bin
goma_ctl ensure_start

pushd engine/src
flutter/tools/gn --goma --no-prebuilt-dart-sdk --unoptimized --full-dart-sdk
autoninja -C out/host_debug_unopt
popd

Building Flutter apps

The Flutter commands used to build and run apps will use the locally built Flutter engine and Dart SDK, instead of the one downloaded by the Flutter tool, if the --local-engine option is provided.

For example, to build and run the Flutter spinning square sample on the web platform,

MONOREPO_PATH=$PWD
cd flutter/examples/layers
flutter --local-engine=host_debug_unopt \
  -d chrome run widgets/spinning_square.dart
cd $MONOREPO_PATH

To build for desktop, specify the desktop platform device in flutter run as -d macos or -d linux or -d windows. You may also need to run the command

flutter create --platforms=windows,macos,linux

on existing apps, such as sample apps. New apps created with flutter create already include these support files. Details of desktop support are at Desktop Support for Flutter

Testing

Tests in the Flutter source tree can be run with the flutter test command, run in the directory of a package containing tests. For example:

MONOREPO_PATH=$PWD
cd flutter/packages/flutter
flutter test --local-engine=host_debug_unopt
cd $MONOREPO_PATH

Troubleshooting

Please file an issue or email the dart-engprod team with any problems with or questions about using monorepo.

We will update this documentation to address them.

  • flutter commands may download the engine and Dart SDK files for the configured channel, even though they will be using the local engine and its SDK.

Windows

  • On Windows, gclient sync needs to be run in an administrator session, because some installed dependencies create symlinks.