stable sort does not work with structs that both define opAssign and disable default-initialization

[dlangBugzillaToGithub]

issues.dlang (@jmdavis) reported this on 2024-10-13T10:23:41Z

Transfered from https://issues.dlang.org/show_bug.cgi?id=24810

Description

The fix for https://issues.dlang.org/show_bug.cgi?id=24773 made it so that this code no longer compiles:

void main()
{
    static struct E
    {
        int value;
        int valid = 42;

        this(int value)
        {
            this.value = value;
        }

        @disable this();

        ~this()
        {
            //assert(valid == 42);
        }
    }

    import std.array : array;
    import std.range : chain, only, repeat;
    auto arr = chain(repeat(E(41), 18),
                     only(E(39)),
                     repeat(E(41), 16),
                     only(E(1)),
                     repeat(E(42), 33),
                     only(E(33)),
                     repeat(E(42), 16),
                     repeat(E(43), 27),
                     only(E(33)),
                     repeat(E(43), 34),
                     only(E(34)),
                     only(E(43)),
                     only(E(63)),
                     repeat(E(44), 42),
                     only(E(27)),
                     repeat(E(44), 11),
                     repeat(E(45), 64),
                     repeat(E(46), 3),
                     only(E(11)),
                     repeat(E(46), 7),
                     only(E(4)),
                     repeat(E(46), 34),
                     only(E(36)),
                     repeat(E(46), 17),
                     repeat(E(47), 36),
                     only(E(39)),
                     repeat(E(47), 26),
                     repeat(E(48), 17),
                     only(E(21)),
                     repeat(E(48), 5),
                     only(E(39)),
                     repeat(E(48), 14),
                     only(E(58)),
                     repeat(E(48), 24),
                     repeat(E(49), 13),
                     only(E(40)),
                     repeat(E(49), 38),
                     only(E(18)),
                     repeat(E(49), 11),
                     repeat(E(50), 6)).array();

    import std.algorithm.mutation : SwapStrategy;
    import std.algorithm.sorting : sort;
    arr.sort!((a, b) => a.value < b.value, SwapStrategy.stable)();
}

However, prior to that fix, if you uncommented the comment in the destructor, the assertion failed, because (as the fix was intended to fix), stable sort was assigning to uninitialized memory even when the type defined opAssign. So, while the change caused code to no longer compile, the code that stopped compiling was actually broken.

The fix that caused this code to be a compilation error instead of being buggy code that compiled took the easy route of just using initialized memory, which is fine in the vast majority of cases. However, larger changes will be necessary to deal with types that don't allow default initialization.

The example given here is an altered version of the one from https://issues.dlang.org/show_bug.cgi?id=24809 (which shows a case which the fix for https://issues.dlang.org/show_bug.cgi?id=24773 did not catch and which also needs to be fixed).