The JScript Type System, Part Six: Even more on arrays in JScript .NET

public function SetValue(value : Object, indices : int[]) : void

The odd thing is the annotation on indices. It is typed as taking a .NET array of integers but in the example in my last entry we give it a literal JScript array, not a hard-typed CLR array.

JScript .NET arrays and hard-typed CLR arrays work together, but because these two kinds of arrays are so different they do not work together perfectly. The problem is essentially that JScript .NET arrays are much more dynamic than CLR arrays. JScript .NET arrays can change size, can have elements of any type, and so on.

The rules for when JScript .NET arrays and CLR arrays may be used in place of each other are not particularly complicated but still you should exercise caution when doing so. In particular, when you use a JScript .NET array in a context where a CLR array is expected you can get unexpected results. Consider this example:

function ChangeArray(arr : int[]) : void

{

  print(arr[0]); // 10

  arr[0] += 100;

}

var jsarr : Array = new Array(10, 20, 30);

ChangeArray(jsarr);

print(jsarr[0]); // 10 or 110?

This might look like it prints out 10 then 110, but in fact it prints out 10 twice. The compiler is unable to turn the dynamic JScript array into a hard-typed array of integers so it does the next best thing. It makes a copy of the JScript array and passes the copy to the function. If the function reads the array then it gets the correct values. If it writes it, then only the copy is updated, not the original.

To warn you about this possibly unintentional consequence of mixing array flavours, the compiler issues the following warning if you do that:

warning JS1215: Converting a JScript Array to a System.Array results in a memory allocation and an array copy

You may now be wondering then why the call to SetValue which had the literal JScript .NET array did not prompt this warning. The warning is suppressed for literal arrays. In the case of literal arrays the compiler can determine that a literal array is being assigned to a CLR array type. The compiler then optimizes away the creation of the JScript .NET array and generates code to create and initialize the CLR array directly. Since there is then no performance impact or unexpected copy, there is no need for a warning.

Note that if every element of the source JScript .NET array cannot be coerced to the type of the hard-typed CLR array then a type mismatch error will be the result. For instance, if you tried to coerce an array containing strings to an array of integers then this would fail:

var arr1 : int[] = new Array(10, "hello", 20); // Type mismatch error at runtime

var arr2 : int[] = [10, "hello", 20];          // Type mismatch error at compile time 

Note also that this applies to multidimensional arrays. There is no syntax for initializing a multidimensional array in JScript .NET:

var mdarr : int[,] = [ [ 1, 2 ], [3, 4] ]; // Nice try, but illegal

A rectangular multidimensional array is not an array of arrays. In this case you are assigning a one-dimensional array which happens to contain arrays to a two-dimensional array of integers. That is not a legal assignment. If, however, you want a ragged hard-typed array it is perfectly legal to do this:

var ragged : int[][] = [ [ 1, 2 ], [3, 4] ];

print(ragged[1][1]); // 4

Rectangular multidimensional arrays are indexed with a comma-separated list inside one set of square brackets. If you use ragged arrays to simulate true multidimensional arrays then the indices each get their own set of brackets.

Note that JScript .NET arrays do not have any of the methods or properties of a CLR array. (Strings, by contract, can be used implicitly as either JScript .NET strings or as System.String values, which I'll talk more about later.)  But JScript .NET arrays do not have CLR array fields like Rank, SetValue, and so on.  

Next time I'll talk a bit about going the other way -- using a CLR array where a JScript array is expected.