Support inline object types

[singpolyma-shopify]

export function add(a: { x: i32 }): i32 {
    return a.x;
}

[dcodeIO]

Should be doable, but with caveats. For example, a type { x: i32, y: i32 } would be incompatible to { y: i32, x: i32 } due to the fact that static field layout differs. Similarly, { x: i32 } would be incompatible to { y: i32, x: i32 } etc.

Question is, should it still be supported nonetheless? Currently, one has to use an explicit class to make it work, i.e.

class MyType { x: i32 }

export function add(a: MyType): i32 {
    return a.x;
}

which feels a bit more natural given the limitations.

[trusktr]

I think it can work, the ordering issues can be abstracted away. If the overall shape of objects is known, regardless of order, then could the compiler just ensure the same order in the output? Or can the compiler just pass the dereferenced values individually to the function parameters ?

[dcodeIO]

Closing this issue as part of 2020 vacuum as it appears to be outdated and superseded by efforts to use a class type instead, and create instances from object literals. The new approach has several advantages in that no virtual lookups are involved.