% Lifetimes

This is the last of three sections presenting Rust’s ownership system. This is one of
Rust’s most distinct and compelling features, with which Rust developers should
become quite acquainted. Ownership is how Rust achieves its largest goal,
memory safety. There are a few distinct concepts, each with its own chapter:

* [ownership][ownership], the key concept
* [borrowing][borrowing], and their associated feature ‘references’
* lifetimes, which you’re reading now

These three chapters are related, and in order. You’ll need all three to fully
understand the ownership system.

[ownership]: ownership.html
[borrowing]: references-and-borrowing.html

# Meta

Before we get to the details, two important notes about the ownership system.

Rust has a focus on safety and speed. It accomplishes these goals through many
‘zero-cost abstractions’, which means that in Rust, abstractions cost as little
as possible in order to make them work. The ownership system is a prime example
of a zero-cost abstraction. All of the analysis we’ll talk about in this guide
is _done at compile time_. You do not pay any run-time cost for any of these
features.

However, this system does have a certain cost: learning curve. Many new users
to Rust experience something we like to call ‘fighting with the borrow
checker’, where the Rust compiler refuses to compile a program that the author
thinks is valid. This often happens because the programmer’s mental model of
how ownership should work doesn’t match the actual rules that Rust implements.
You probably will experience similar things at first. There is good news,
however: more experienced Rust developers report that once they work with the
rules of the ownership system for a period of time, they fight the borrow
checker less and less.

With that in mind, let’s learn about lifetimes.

# Lifetimes

Lending out a reference to a resource that someone else owns can be
complicated. For example, imagine this set of operations:

1. I acquire a handle to some kind of resource.
2. I lend you a reference to the resource.
3. I decide I’m done with the resource, and deallocate it, while you still have
  your reference.
4. You decide to use the resource.

Uh oh! Your reference is pointing to an invalid resource. This is called a
dangling pointer or ‘use after free’, when the resource is memory. A small
example of such a situation would be:

```rust,compile_fail
let r;              // Introduce reference: r
{
    let i = 1;      // Introduce scoped value: i
    r = &i;         // Store reference of i in r
}                   // i goes out of scope and is dropped.

println!("{}", r);  // r still refers to i
```

To fix this, we have to make sure that step four never happens after step
three. In the small example above the Rust compiler is able to report the issue
as it can see the lifetimes of the various values in the function.

When we have a function that takes arguments by reference the situation becomes
more complex. Consider the following example:

```rust,compile_fail,E0106
fn skip_prefix(line: &str, prefix: &str) -> &str {
    // ...
#   line
}

let line = "lang:en=Hello World!";
let lang = "en";

let v;
{
    let p = format!("lang:{}=", lang);  // -+ p goes into scope
    v = skip_prefix(line, p.as_str());  //  |
}                                       // -+ p goes out of scope
println!("{}", v);
```

Here we have a function `skip_prefix` which takes two `&str` references
as parameters and returns a single `&str` reference. We call it
by passing in references to `line` and `p`: Two variables with different
lifetimes. Now the safety of the `println!`-line depends on whether the
reference returned by `skip_prefix` function references the still living
`line` or the already dropped `p` string.

Because of the above ambiguity, Rust will refuse to compile the example
code. To get it to compile we need to tell the compiler more about the
lifetimes of the references. This can be done by making the lifetimes
explicit in the function declaration:

```rust
fn skip_prefix<'a, 'b>(line: &'a str, prefix: &'b str) -> &'a str {
    // ...
#   line
}
```

Let's examine the changes without going too deep into the syntax for now -
we'll get to that later. The first change was adding the `<'a, 'b>` after the
method name. This introduces two lifetime parameters: `'a` and `'b`. Next each
reference in the function signature was associated with one of the lifetime
parameters by adding the lifetime name after the `&`. This tells the compiler
how the lifetimes between different references are related.

As a result the compiler is now able to deduce that the return value of
`skip_prefix` has the same lifetime as the `line` parameter, which makes the `v`
reference safe to use even after the `p` goes out of scope in the original
example.

In addition to the compiler being able to validate the usage of `skip_prefix`
return value, it can also ensure that the implementation follows the contract
established by the function declaration. This is useful especially when you are
implementing traits that are introduced [later in the book][traits].

**Note** It's important to understand that lifetime annotations are
_descriptive_, not _prescriptive_. This means that how long a reference is valid
is determined by the code, not by the annotations. The annotations, however,
give information about lifetimes to the compiler that uses them to check the
validity of references. The compiler can do so without annotations in simple
cases, but needs the programmers support in complex scenarios.

[traits]: traits.html

# Syntax

The `'a` reads ‘the lifetime a’. Technically, every reference has some lifetime
associated with it, but the compiler lets you elide (i.e. omit, see
["Lifetime Elision"][lifetime-elision] below) them in common cases. Before we
get to that, though, let’s look at a short example with explicit lifetimes:

[lifetime-elision]: #lifetime-elision

```rust,ignore
fn bar<'a>(...)
```

We previously talked a little about [function syntax][functions], but we didn’t
discuss the `<>`s after a function’s name. A function can have ‘generic
parameters’ between the `<>`s, of which lifetimes are one kind. We’ll discuss
other kinds of generics [later in the book][generics], but for now, let’s
focus on the lifetimes aspect.

[functions]: functions.html
[generics]: generics.html

We use `<>` to declare our lifetimes. This says that `bar` has one lifetime,
`'a`. If we had two reference parameters with different lifetimes, it would
look like this:


```rust,ignore
fn bar<'a, 'b>(...)
```

Then in our parameter list, we use the lifetimes we’ve named:

```rust,ignore
...(x: &'a i32)
```

If we wanted a `&mut` reference, we’d do this:

```rust,ignore
...(x: &'a mut i32)
```

If you compare `&mut i32` to `&'a mut i32`, they’re the same, it’s that
the lifetime `'a` has snuck in between the `&` and the `mut i32`. We read `&mut
i32` as ‘a mutable reference to an `i32`’ and `&'a mut i32` as ‘a mutable
reference to an `i32` with the lifetime `'a`’.

# In `struct`s

You’ll also need explicit lifetimes when working with [`struct`][structs]s that
contain references:

```rust
struct Foo<'a> {
    x: &'a i32,
}

fn main() {
    let y = &5; // this is the same as `let _y = 5; let y = &_y;`
    let f = Foo { x: y };

    println!("{}", f.x);
}
```

[structs]: structs.html

As you can see, `struct`s can also have lifetimes. In a similar way to functions,

```rust
struct Foo<'a> {
# x: &'a i32,
# }
```

declares a lifetime, and

```rust
# struct Foo<'a> {
x: &'a i32,
# }
```

uses it. So why do we need a lifetime here? We need to ensure that any reference
to a `Foo` cannot outlive the reference to an `i32` it contains.

## `impl` blocks

Let’s implement a method on `Foo`:

```rust
struct Foo<'a> {
    x: &'a i32,
}

impl<'a> Foo<'a> {
    fn x(&self) -> &'a i32 { self.x }
}

fn main() {
    let y = &5; // this is the same as `let _y = 5; let y = &_y;`
    let f = Foo { x: y };

    println!("x is: {}", f.x());
}
```

As you can see, we need to declare a lifetime for `Foo` in the `impl` line. We repeat
`'a` twice, like on functions: `impl<'a>` defines a lifetime `'a`, and `Foo<'a>`
uses it.

## Multiple lifetimes

If you have multiple references, you can use the same lifetime multiple times:

```rust
fn x_or_y<'a>(x: &'a str, y: &'a str) -> &'a str {
#    x
# }
```

This says that `x` and `y` both are alive for the same scope, and that the
return value is also alive for that scope. If you wanted `x` and `y` to have
different lifetimes, you can use multiple lifetime parameters:

```rust
fn x_or_y<'a, 'b>(x: &'a str, y: &'b str) -> &'a str {
#    x
# }
```

In this example, `x` and `y` have different valid scopes, but the return value
has the same lifetime as `x`.

## Thinking in scopes

A way to think about lifetimes is to visualize the scope that a reference is
valid for. For example:

```rust
fn main() {
    let y = &5;     // -+ y goes into scope
                    //  |
    // stuff        //  |
                    //  |
}                   // -+ y goes out of scope
```

Adding in our `Foo`:

```rust
struct Foo<'a> {
    x: &'a i32,
}

fn main() {
    let y = &5;           // -+ y goes into scope
    let f = Foo { x: y }; // -+ f goes into scope
    // stuff              //  |
                          //  |
}                         // -+ f and y go out of scope
```

Our `f` lives within the scope of `y`, so everything works. What if it didn’t?
This code won’t work:

```rust,ignore
struct Foo<'a> {
    x: &'a i32,
}

fn main() {
    let x;                    // -+ x goes into scope
                              //  |
    {                         //  |
        let y = &5;           // ---+ y goes into scope
        let f = Foo { x: y }; // ---+ f goes into scope
        x = &f.x;             //  | | error here
    }                         // ---+ f and y go out of scope
                              //  |
    println!("{}", x);        //  |
}                             // -+ x goes out of scope
```

Whew! As you can see here, the scopes of `f` and `y` are smaller than the scope
of `x`. But when we do `x = &f.x`, we make `x` a reference to something that’s
about to go out of scope.

Named lifetimes are a way of giving these scopes a name. Giving something a
name is the first step towards being able to talk about it.

## 'static

The lifetime named ‘static’ is a special lifetime. It signals that something
has the lifetime of the entire program. Most Rust programmers first come across
`'static` when dealing with strings:

```rust
let x: &'static str = "Hello, world.";
```

String literals have the type `&'static str` because the reference is always
alive: they are baked into the data segment of the final binary. Another
example are globals:

```rust
static FOO: i32 = 5;
let x: &'static i32 = &FOO;
```

This adds an `i32` to the data segment of the binary, and `x` is a reference
to it.

## Lifetime Elision

Rust supports powerful local type inference in the bodies of functions but not in their item signatures. 
It's forbidden to allow reasoning about types based on the item signature alone. 
However, for ergonomic reasons, a very restricted secondary inference algorithm called 
“lifetime elision” does apply when judging lifetimes. Lifetime elision is concerned solely to infer 
lifetime parameters using three easily memorizable and unambiguous rules. This means lifetime elision 
acts as a shorthand for writing an item signature, while not hiding
away the actual types involved as full local inference would if applied to it.

When talking about lifetime elision, we use the terms *input lifetime* and
*output lifetime*. An *input lifetime* is a lifetime associated with a parameter
of a function, and an *output lifetime* is a lifetime associated with the return
value of a function. For example, this function has an input lifetime:

```rust,ignore
fn foo<'a>(bar: &'a str)
```

This one has an output lifetime:

```rust,ignore
fn foo<'a>() -> &'a str
```

This one has a lifetime in both positions:

```rust,ignore
fn foo<'a>(bar: &'a str) -> &'a str
```

Here are the three rules:

* Each elided lifetime in a function’s arguments becomes a distinct lifetime
  parameter.

* If there is exactly one input lifetime, elided or not, that lifetime is
  assigned to all elided lifetimes in the return values of that function.

* If there are multiple input lifetimes, but one of them is `&self` or `&mut
  self`, the lifetime of `self` is assigned to all elided output lifetimes.

Otherwise, it is an error to elide an output lifetime.

### Examples

Here are some examples of functions with elided lifetimes.  We’ve paired each
example of an elided lifetime with its expanded form.

```rust,ignore
fn print(s: &str); // elided
fn print<'a>(s: &'a str); // expanded

fn debug(lvl: u32, s: &str); // elided
fn debug<'a>(lvl: u32, s: &'a str); // expanded
```

In the preceding example, `lvl` doesn’t need a lifetime because it’s not a
reference (`&`). Only things relating to references (such as a `struct`
which contains a reference) need lifetimes.

```rust,ignore
fn substr(s: &str, until: u32) -> &str; // elided
fn substr<'a>(s: &'a str, until: u32) -> &'a str; // expanded

fn get_str() -> &str; // ILLEGAL, no inputs

fn frob(s: &str, t: &str) -> &str; // ILLEGAL, two inputs
fn frob<'a, 'b>(s: &'a str, t: &'b str) -> &str; // Expanded: Output lifetime is ambiguous

fn get_mut(&mut self) -> &mut T; // elided
fn get_mut<'a>(&'a mut self) -> &'a mut T; // expanded

fn args<T: ToCStr>(&mut self, args: &[T]) -> &mut Command; // elided
fn args<'a, 'b, T: ToCStr>(&'a mut self, args: &'b [T]) -> &'a mut Command; // expanded

fn new(buf: &mut [u8]) -> BufWriter; // elided
fn new<'a>(buf: &'a mut [u8]) -> BufWriter<'a>; // expanded
```
