Trait std::convert::AsRef

1.0.0 · source · [−]
pub trait AsRef<T> where
    T: ?Sized, {
    fn as_ref(&self) -> &T;
}
Expand description

Used to do a cheap reference-to-reference conversion.

This trait is similar to AsMut which is used for converting between mutable references. If you need to do a costly conversion it is better to implement From with type &T or write a custom function.

AsRef has the same signature as Borrow, but Borrow is different in a few aspects:

  • Unlike AsRef, Borrow has a blanket impl for any T, and can be used to accept either a reference or a value.
  • Borrow also requires that Hash, Eq and Ord for a borrowed value are equivalent to those of the owned value. For this reason, if you want to borrow only a single field of a struct you can implement AsRef, but not Borrow.

Note: This trait must not fail. If the conversion can fail, use a dedicated method which returns an Option<T> or a Result<T, E>.

Generic Implementations

  • AsRef auto-dereferences if the inner type is a reference or a mutable reference (e.g.: foo.as_ref() will work the same if foo has type &mut Foo or &&mut Foo)

Examples

By using trait bounds we can accept arguments of different types as long as they can be converted to the specified type T.

For example: By creating a generic function that takes an AsRef<str> we express that we want to accept all references that can be converted to &str as an argument. Since both String and &str implement AsRef<str> we can accept both as input argument.

fn is_hello<T: AsRef<str>>(s: T) {
   assert_eq!("hello", s.as_ref());
}

let s = "hello";
is_hello(s);

let s = "hello".to_string();
is_hello(s);
Run

Required Methods

Converts this type into a shared reference of the (usually inferred) input type.

Implementors