Compile to a Self-Contained AST


It does not matter where the [`import`] statement occurs — e.g. deep within statements blocks
or within [function] bodies.

When a script imports external modules that may not be available later on, it is possible to eagerly pre-resolve these imports and embed them directly into a self-contained AST.

For instance, a system may periodically connect to a central source (e.g. a database) to load scripts and compile them to AST form. Afterwards, in order to conserve bandwidth (or due to other physical limitations), it is disconnected from the central source for self-contained operation.

Compile a script into a self-contained AST via Engine::compile_into_self_contained.

let mut engine = Engine::new();

// Compile script into self-contained AST using the current
// module resolver (default to `FileModuleResolver`) to pre-resolve
// 'import' statements.
let ast = engine.compile_into_self_contained(&mut scope, script)?;

// Make sure we can no longer resolve any module!
engine.set_module_resolver(DummyModuleResolver::new());

// The AST still evaluates fine, even with 'import' statements!
engine.run(&ast)?;

When such an AST is evaluated, import statements within are provided the pre-resolved modules without going through the normal module resolution process.

Only Static Paths

Engine::compile_into_self_contained only pre-resolves import statements in the script that are static, i.e. with a path that is a string literal.

// The following import is pre-resolved.
import "hello" as h;

if some_event() {
    // The following import is pre-resolved.
    import "hello" as h;
}

fn foo() {
    // The following import is pre-resolved.
    import "hello" as h;
}

// The following import is also pre-resolved because the expression
// is usually optimized into a single string during compilation.
import "he" + "llo" as h;

let module_name = "hello";

// The following import is NOT pre-resolved.
import module_name as h;