Generics: Type Erasure

Parameterized types with generics give you type safety without runtime checks.

Generic type information is not available at runtime: this is called "erasure". If you need this information, consider using reified generics.

function takes_ints(vec<int> $items): vec<int> {
  return $items;
}

When the type checker runs, a call takes_ints(vec["hello"]) will produce a type error. At runtime, since the parameter int is erased, we only check that the argument and return type is a vec.

Awaitable Types

For async functions, Hack will also enforce the wrapped return type at runtime. For example, the following function will produce a runtime error:

async function my_foo(): Awaitable<int> {
  return "not an int";
}

Erasure Limitations

Erasure prevents you using a generic type parameter T in the following situations:

• Creating instances: new T()
• Calling static methods: T::aStaticMethod()
• Type checks: is T
• As the type of a static property.
• As the type of the exception in a catch block: catch (T $exception)

For passing around class names for instantiation, Hack provides classname<T> that extends the representation of Foo::class.