Types: Soft Types

A soft type hint <<__Soft>> Foo allows you to add types to code without crashing if you get the type wrong.

function probably_int(<<__Soft>> int $x): @int {
  return $x + 1;
}

function definitely_int(int $x): int {
  return $x + 1;
}

Calling definitely_int("foo") will produce an error at runtime, whereas probably_int("foo") will only log a warning.

The type checker treats both definitely_int and probably_int the same way. Code completion and type checks are identical.

Soft type hints are useful when migrating partial code or very dynamic code to strict mode. Once you've fixed your code, and you're not seeing any more warnings, then you can remove the <<__Soft>>.

Previous versions of Hack used @Foo syntax instead of <<__Soft>> Foo.