For every dynamic array variable x in a function: * Scan every statement in the function for length-changing assignment to x. Distinguish three cases: (a) assignment from something of known length x = array literal of length N x = static array of length N x.length = N x = new T[N] ---> For all of these, the possible length of X is equal to the range of N. (b) relative length change by a known amount x ~= expression_of_fixed_length; x.length += N; x = x ~ expression_of_fixed_length; If any of these occur inside a loop or a nested function (or in a function with a goto statement), the range of x is 0..size_t; except in the case where length = length - N. Otherwise, new range of range of x.length = oldrange + N.range. (c) anything else conservatively assume that the length of x could be 0..size_t/(x[0].sizeof). * Any use of asm or a pointer inside the function should set the range of all arrays to 0..size_t/(x[0].sizeof). The reason I think this is valuable, is that most arrays do not arbitrarily change size throughout a function. Benefits: (1) Eliminate most false positives from signed-unsigned mismatches. Cases like this: int [] x = new int[6]; // or x = some array literal. for (int i = 0; i < x.length; ++i) {...} As long as x is only assigned from an object of known length, this sort of thing is always safe. (2) This minimal array-length range tracking would also allow some out-of-bounds array indexing errors to be detected at compile time.
This applies to any (member) variable and is by no means specific to 'length' (apart from the size_t/sizeof trick, which should be the IntRange for ArrayLengthExp)
THIS ISSUE HAS BEEN MOVED TO GITHUB https://github.com/dlang/dmd/issues/18361 DO NOT COMMENT HERE ANYMORE, NOBODY WILL SEE IT, THIS ISSUE HAS BEEN MOVED TO GITHUB