Dealing with macros and expansions

Sometimes we might encounter Rust macro expansions while working with Clippy. While macro expansions are not as dramatic and profound as the expansion of our universe, they can certainly bring chaos to the orderly world of code and logic.

The general rule of thumb is that we should ignore code with macro expansions when working with Clippy because the code can be dynamic in ways that are difficult or impossible for us to foresee.

False Positives

What exactly do we mean by dynamic in ways that are difficult to foresee?

Macros are expanded in the EarlyLintPass level, so the Abstract Syntax Tree (AST) is generated in place of macros. This means the code which we work with in Clippy is already expanded.

If we wrote a new lint, there is a possibility that the lint is triggered in macro-generated code. Since this expanded macro code is not written by the macro's user but really by the macro's author, the user cannot and should not be responsible for fixing the issue that triggers the lint.

Besides, a Span in a macro can be changed by the macro author. Therefore, any lint check related to lines or columns should be avoided since they might be changed at any time and become unreliable or incorrect information.

Because of these unforeseeable or unstable behaviors, macro expansion should often not be regarded as a part of the stable API. This is also why most lints check if they are inside a macro or not before emitting suggestions to the end user to avoid false positives.

How to Work with Macros

Several functions are available for working with macros.

The Span.from_expansion method

We could utilize a span's from_expansion method, which detects if the span is from a macro expansion / desugaring. This is a very common first step in a lint:

#![allow(unused)]
fn main() {
if expr.span.from_expansion() {
    // We most likely want to ignore it.
    return;
}
}

Span.ctxt method

The span's context, given by the method ctxt and returning SpanContext, represents if the span is from a macro expansion and, if it is, which macro call expanded this span.

Sometimes, it is useful to check if the context of two spans are equal. For instance, suppose we have the following line of code that would expand into 1 + 0:

#![allow(unused)]
fn main() {
// The following code expands to `1 + 0` for both `EarlyLintPass` and `LateLintPass`
1 + mac!()
}

Assuming that we'd collect the 1 expression as a variable left and the 0/mac!() expression as a variable right, we can simply compare their contexts. If the context is different, then we most likely are dealing with a macro expansion and should just ignore it:

#![allow(unused)]
fn main() {
if left.span.ctxt() != right.span.ctxt() {
    // The code author most likely cannot modify this expression
    return;
}
}

Note: Code that is not from expansion is in the "root" context. So any spans whose from_expansion returns false can be assumed to have the same context. Because of this, using span.from_expansion() is often sufficient.

Going a bit deeper, in a simple expression such as a == b, a and b have the same context. However, in a macro_rules! with a == $b, $b is expanded to an expression that contains a different context from a.

Take a look at the following macro m:

#![allow(unused)]
fn main() {
macro_rules! m {
    ($a:expr, $b:expr) => {
        if $a.is_some() {
            $b;
        }
    }
}

let x: Option<u32> = Some(42);
m!(x, x.unwrap());
}

If the m!(x, x.unwrap()); line is expanded, we would get two expanded expressions:

• x.is_some() (from the $a.is_some() line in the m macro)
• x.unwrap() (corresponding to $b in the m macro)

Suppose x.is_some() expression's span is associated with the x_is_some_span variable and x.unwrap() expression's span is associated with x_unwrap_span variable, we could assume that these two spans do not share the same context:

#![allow(unused)]
fn main() {
// x.is_some() is from inside the macro
// x.unwrap() is from outside the macro
assert_ne!(x_is_some_span.ctxt(), x_unwrap_span.ctxt());
}

The in_external_macro function

rustc_middle::lint provides a function (in_external_macro) that can detect if the given span is from a macro defined in a foreign crate.

Therefore, if we really want a new lint to work with macro-generated code, this is the next line of defense to avoid macros not defined inside the current crate since it is unfair to the user if Clippy lints code which the user cannot change.

For example, assume we have the following code that is being examined by Clippy:

#![allow(unused)]
fn main() {
#[macro_use]
extern crate a_foreign_crate_with_macros;

// `foo` macro is defined in `a_foreign_crate_with_macros`
foo!("bar");
}

Also assume that we get the corresponding variable foo_span for the foo macro call, we could decide not to lint if in_external_macro results in true (note that cx can be EarlyContext or LateContext):

#![allow(unused)]
fn main() {
if in_external_macro(cx.sess(), foo_span) {
    // We should ignore macro from a foreign crate.
    return;
}
}