Type and Returns Sugar

Note: This proposal has been superseded by ZE-017 Type Hints and Type Matching, which promotes type hints from syntactic sugar to a first-class language feature and removes the underlying @Type and @Returns attributes entirely.

Introduction

This proposal introduces a compact signature syntax that desugars to existing annotations:
greet(name: String) -> String becomes @Returns(String) greet(@String name).
The goal is to reduce annotation noise while staying fully compatible with the
attr system.

Motivation

Zirric uses @Type and @Returns to describe function signatures. While explicit
annotations are flexible, simple signatures are verbose to write and read,
especially in data and annotation declarations where signatures serve as
documentation. A concise syntax improves readability without changing runtime
semantics.

Proposed Solution

Add a signature sugar that is allowed in:

• let declarations
• fn declarations
• function fields inside data
• function fields inside attr

Examples

// fn declaration
fn greet(name: String) -> String {
  "Hello, " + name
}

Desugars to:

@Returns(String)
fn greet(@String name) {
  "Hello, " + name
}

// let declaration
let name: String = "Zirric"

// data fields
data Greeter {
  greet(name: String) -> String
  greeting: String
}

// annotation fields
attr Formatter {
  format(value: String) -> String
}

Desugaring rules

• let var: T desugars to @Type(T) let var
• var: T desugars to @Type(T) var for parameters and in fields.
• -> T desugars to @Returns(T) on the declaration or field.

Detailed Design

Scope and limitations

• The : and -> syntax is sugar only; it has no runtime effect beyond the
  existing annotations it produces.
• If both the sugar and explicit annotations specify the same data (e.g.,
  @Returns and ->), the compiler should report a duplicate/ambiguous annotation
  error to avoid hidden conflicts.
• The type reference after : or -> uses the same rules as @Type, so
  String, module.Type, and other static references are valid.

Changes to the Standard Library

None. The feature only uses existing @Type and @Returns annotations.

Alternatives Considered

• Status quo: keep only explicit @Type and @Returns.
  • Simple implementation, but verbose and harder to read.

Acknowledgements

• Inspired by type decorator and property wrapper syntax in languages like TypeScript and Swift.