Should we support user-defined destructuring behavior and custom extractor pattern logic?

[munificent]

The patterns proposal has "extractor patterns" that look like:

Foo(a, b, c)

In other words, like a function or constructor call, except the arguments are subpatterns instead of subexpressions. This syntax is part of pattern matching in most other languages that have patterns. In Dart the proposal says they work like this:

1. The identifier at the beginning of the pattern should resolve to the name of a type.
2. If the value being matched is that type, then treat the rest of the pattern as a record pattern and match the value against that record pattern.
3. Record patterns can match values of arbitrary classes. If the record pattern has positional fields, the class must implement a Destructure_n_ interface. For named fields, the pattern just directly invokes getters with the same name.

This covers the common case of algebraic datatype style matches against a family of subtypes. And, for named fields in the record pattern, the class doesn't have to add any special support at all. It just works, for free.

I think this default built-in behavior is fine, but it's fairly limited. It might be nice if users could define custom behavior for how an object is matched or destructured. F# has active patterns and Scala has unapply() methods for this.

An early version of the patterns actually had a design for this but for reasons I can't recall it didn't end up in the current version. I still think it's a good idea, so here's a simple proposed change:

---

Resolve the name on the extractor pattern to a type. If the name resolves to a type that declares a static method named extract() then:

1. The method must take a single positional parameter. It is a compile-time error if the static type of the value being matched is not a subtype of the parameter's type.

   When the pattern is evaluated, the method is invoked with the value being matched. The method returns null to indicate a failed match. Returning any other value is a valid match, and the resulting value is then matched against the extractor pattern's record. (Typically, the extract() method will return a record, but it doesn't have to since any object can be matched in a record pattern.)

   If the return type of the method is non-nullable, then the extractor will always match, so this extract() method can be used as a binder pattern. If the return type is nullable, it can only be used as a matcher pattern.

2. Otherwise, fall back to the current "type test and record match" behavior.

A couple of questions and thoughts:

• Instead of making it a compile time error if the value's static type isn't a subtype of the extract() method's parameter type, should it implicitly insert a type test and automatically fail if the value isn't of the parameter's type?

• Should we allow free-floating extractor functions by allowing the extractor pattern name to resolve to a function declaration? What about resolving to an instance method on the matched value's type?

Thoughts?

[Levi-Lesches]

3. Record patterns can match values of arbitrary classes. If the record pattern has positional fields, the class must implement a Destructure_n_ interface. For named fields, the pattern just directly invokes getters with the same name. ... It might be nice if users could define custom behavior for how an object is matched or destructured.

I'm not sure I understand this. If a class implements a Destructure_n interface, then isn't that how it specifies how it should be restructured? It would be weird if a class implemented Destructure1 with field a, but actually defined an extract that allows it to destructure to b instead. Same for named fields: specifying a record pattern that asks for a field by name shouldn't give you some other field that was defined in extract.

[munificent]

If a class implements a Destructure_n interface, then isn't that how it specifies how it should be restructured?

For positional fields, yes. That's a good point. But the current proposal doesn't give you any way of defining custom logic for destructuring to named fields.

And having the main class implement Destructure_n may not be the best design for positional destructuring either. It means that the class itself exposes those positional fields through public getters. The class author might not want to have the class's public API cluttered with those getters just to allow the class to be destructured positionally in a pattern. A custom extract() method would let them do that without the class itself needing to implement Destructure_n_.

[Levi-Lesches]

But the current proposal doesn't give you any way of defining custom logic for destructuring to named fields.

Are we sure it should? I see the patterns proposal as a shorthand for code that would otherwise be written by the API user, not the author. Using a record pattern to extract named fields from a class is akin to writing out the fields manually.

if (myVar is User) {
  int age = myVar.age;
  String username = myVar.username;
  print("$age, $username");
}

For the API author to be able to change that, such that writing a pattern is no longer equivalent to the above, is sure to be a source of confusion. At least, it's one more disconnect between appearance and behavior, and one more thing that can cause a breaking change. It's natural to need some explicit instruction on how to destructure positional fields, but named fields already have their names to go by.

[Levi-Lesches]

And having the main class implement Destructure_n may not be the best design for positional destructuring either.

I agree. Maybe, instead of implementing DestructureN, it should return a DestructureN in a method? It could implement a different interface to indicate such. That would also be more in line with the iterable nature of a record that contains positional parameters that shouldn't be assigned a name.

So here is how I understand the current proposal to be:

class CoordinatePair implements Destructure2<double, double> {
  final double x, y;
  const CoordinatePair(this.x, this.y);  

  @override
  double field0 => x;

  @override
  double field1 => y;
}

class CoordinatePair3D extends CoordinatePair implements Destructure3<double, double, double> {
  final double z;
  const CoordinatePair3D(int x, int y, this.z) : super(x, y);

  @override 
  double field2 => z;
}

But by returning a DestructureN, we can clean this up:

// Some classes to mock the records feature
abstract class Destructure { }
class Destructure1<T> extends Destructure { }
class Destructure2<T1, T2> extends Destructure { }
class Destructure3<T1, T2, T3> extends Destructure2<T1, T2> { }
class Record2<T1, T2> implements Destructure2<T1, T2> { Record2(T1 x, T2 y); }
class Record3<T1, T2, T3> extends Record2<T1, T2> implements Destructure3<T1, T2, T3> { Record3(T1 x, T2 y, T3 z) : super(x, y); }
abstract class Destructurable<T extends Destructure> { T destructure(); }

// A 2D coordinate pair that can be destructured into (x, y).
class CoordinatePair implements Destructurable<Destructure2> {
  final double x, y;
  const CoordinatePair(this.x, this.y);  

  /// Returns a record with positional parameters
  @override
  Destructure2<double, double> destructure() => Record2(x, y);
}

// A 3D coordinate group that can be destructured into (x, y, z).
class CoordinatePair3D extends CoordinatePair {
  final double z;
  const CoordinatePair3D(double x, double y, this.z) : super(x, y);

  @override
  Destructure3<double, double, double> destructure() => Record3(x, y, z);
}

void main() {
  final pair2d = CoordinatePair(1, 2);
  final pair3d = CoordinatePair3D(1, 2, 3);

  // The pair classes implement Destructure2 and Destructure3, so 
  // we can use pattern syntax to get the following:
  var [x, y] = pair2d;
  var [x, y, z] = pair3d;
}

This also keeps the API clean as we don't have to add individual getters for each field, but rather one method to show Dart how it destructures.

[lrhn]

In general, I'm against introducing a new way to deconstruct objects. Just use getters! (And consider operator[] a getter for this purpose, just like we treat operator[]= as a setter in many cases).

How and what to inspect in an object is something decided by the one doing the inspection, not the one writing the original class. That's why having the class itself decide which tuple to return from extract is putting the responsibility in the wrong place. The author of the class don't know what people want to check against. They should just worry about exposing the properties they want to expose, as getters. Then let anyone match against those getters. If the extract function exposes more values than the class itself, then it's an inconsistent design (people will use the extract function to get to those values, since it's the only way and the value is effectively public). If it exposes fewer, then you still need to be able to match against getters for the rest. If it's exactly the same, you can just use the getters.

The same thing for the Destructure_n_ interfaces: It's not something a class author should have to worry about, and not something they should clutter their class API with.

Nothing prevents a class from having a (int, int, String, isValid: bool) get asTuple; if they want to, but presumably there is a meaning to that tuple, not just a speculative "someone might want to do pattern matching" hypothesis.

In short: Putting the class itself in charge of destructuring is putting the responsibility in the wrong place. Allowing destructuring via getters allows the person doing the match to specify any public property of the class.

(Might want to treat a class with int get length and T operator[](int) as list-like and allow list patterns to be used against it.)

[munificent]

Maybe, instead of implementing DestructureN, it should return a DestructureN in a method?

We could make it even simpler than that since records with positional fields are already a proposed built-in type that implements a destructurable series of positional fields. So we could say that a class that wants to support positional destructuring simply returns a record with the desired positional fields. Like:

// A 2D coordinate pair that can be destructured into (x, y).
class CoordinatePair implements Destructurable<Destructure2> {
  final double x, y;
  const CoordinatePair(this.x, this.y);  

  /// Returns a record with positional parameters
  @override
  (double, double) destructure() => (x, y);
}

// A 3D coordinate group that can be destructured into (x, y, z).
class CoordinatePair3D extends CoordinatePair {
  final double z;
  const CoordinatePair3D(double x, double y, this.z) : super(x, y);

  @override
  (double, double, double) destructure() => (x, y, z);
}

The main downside is that it requires allocating a second object and copying all of the destructured positional fields over. Also, it's not consistent with named fields which are all accessed directly on the original matched object.

[munificent]

In general, I'm against introducing a new way to deconstruct objects. Just use getters! (And consider operator[] a getter for this purpose, just like we treat operator[]= as a setter in many cases).

I agree that calling getters on the object is the best default behavior.

How and what to inspect in an object is something decided by the one doing the inspection, not the one writing the original class.

But the original class does choose which getters to expose.

That's why having the class itself decide which tuple to return from extract is putting the responsibility in the wrong place. The author of the class don't know what people want to check against. They should just worry about exposing the properties they want to expose, as getters. Then let anyone match against those getters.

Yeah, I think that works pretty well for named field destructuring.

But take a step back. Instead of thinking of destructuring as paralleling property access compare it to constructors. You can think of patterns as duals to expressions that produce values.

Classes do control what constructor it provides and which parameters it expects. It make take parameters that do not precisely map to the public getters on the class. Also, the class may provide multiple different named constructors. All of that seems to be a useful way for a class to provide multiple expressive ways of building up an instance.

Custom extractor methods and functions are the dual to that. An extract() method on a class is like an unnamed constructor that doesn't take an explicit parameter for every single field. If we allow separate named extractor functions, then each one is analogous to a named constructor. It says "here is one way to view the state of this class and decompose it". For example, you could imagine:

class Color {
  final int red, green, blue;

  Color(this.red, this.green, this.blue);

  /// Allow accessing the color fields positionally since there is a natural
  /// order.
  static (int, int, int) extract() => (red, green, blue);
}

// Could also support free-floating extractor functions:
(int, int, int) hsv(Color c) =>
    // Convert RGB to HSV and return tuple...

(int, int, int) lab(Color c) =>
    // Convert RGB to Lab and return tuple...

Then users could write code like:

describeColor(Color c) {
  case rgb(0, 0, 0): print('Black');
  case rgb(255, 255, 255): print('White');
  case hsv(_, 0, _): print('Monochrome');
  case hsv(hue, _, _) if (hue > 80 && hue < 140): print('Greenish');
  // Etc.
}

[Levi-Lesches]

We could make it even simpler than that since records with positional fields are already a proposed built-in type that implements a destructurable series of positional fields.

That's what I meant. I was just trying to understand the subtyping relations between records so I made them into classes for testing in DartPad. Like how CoordinatePair3D extends CoordinatePair which in turn implements Destructure2, so Record3 has to be a subtype of Record2, and just drop the last value. All that to say that a (double, double, dynamic) needs to be able to be used as a (double, double).

---

Nothing prevents a class from having a (int, int, String, isValid: bool) get asTuple; if they want to, but presumably there is a meaning to that tuple, not just a speculative "someone might want to do pattern matching" hypothesis.

I'm in agreement here, and I think @munificent's explicit naming of rgb vs hsv vs lab supports that: APIs are better off being explicit about ordering and semantics rather than saying "here are some values in some order, you should know what to do". However...

(Might want to treat a class with int get length and T operator[](int) as list-like and allow list patterns to be used against it.)

It seems there are some cases where a "default" ordering is implied and supporting that can be a good thing. Like CoordinatePair(3D), ColorRGB, and even MapEntry. Magically interpreting a class with length and [] getters seems more on the Python side (with __len__ and __getitem__) than Dart, where even Comparable is used instead of > and <. In these cases, I do think explicitly implementing a Destructurable interface signals what values and types need to be returned and makes the API clear about its intentions, as well as what's expected of subclasses.

I am worried that in cases where multiple destructurings are valid, like Color, API authors will tend to use Destructurable for convenience, but then when they realize they want more options, those would be named, like hsv and lab. That would lead to confusion about what the "default" is and why. But then again, @munificent is right that this is already done with constructors: Flutter's Color class takes in a hex value by default, and has the optional .fromARGB and .fromRGBO named constructors for those who need it. Sometimes giving API authors the freedom to make bad choices -- and trusting them not to -- can be a good compromise.

[lrhn]

I actually disagree that creating a tuple from an object is the dual of creating an object from a tuple (constructor and parameters), ... no matter how obvious it might seem.

Going from a parameter list/tuple to an object is going from structural and transparent data with no given meaning and no behavior (no methods), to an abstraction which can hide data and exposes behavior and some properties. It introduces abstraction.

Going in the other direction removes, and potentially breaks, abstraction. That's bad, we don't want to encourage breaking abstraction. You can't invert a constructor (we tried(, because that requires understanding the abstraction, and some data put into the constructor might just not be publicly available from the class, or available at all.

There is nothing inherently wrong with a class deciding to expose a tuple as a getter. Or expose an object combining multiple properties as a getter. So, the Color example could let color have a getter like Tuple<int, int, int> get hsv => ... and then the pattern to match it would just be case {hsv: (_, 0, _)}: .... Or it could return a named tuple, Tuple<int hue, int saturation, int value> get hsv => ... and case {hsv: (saturation: 0, ...)}. Or an object, HsvColor get hsv => ... and case {hsv: {saturation: 0}}. (And those getters can be extension getters, if you want to add them from the side).

The point is that there is no need to introduce new destructuring features to allow classes to expose things in ways that are meaningful to them, they can already use a getter. Looking for a "destructor" abstraction isn't necessary, because that's still just equivalent to a getter returning a tuple.

[munificent]

Magically interpreting a class with length and [] getters seems more on the Python side (with __len__ and __getitem__) than Dart

This is only for list patterns like:

var [a, b, c] = someObject;

Here, someObject could be any class that implements List<T> and the pattern will call [] and length on the object. I think it's pretty natural to map the [...] pattern syntax to that protocol.

So, the Color example could let color have a getter like Tuple<int, int, int> get hsv => ... and then the pattern to match it would just be case {hsv: (_, 0, _)}: .... Or it could return a named tuple, Tuple<int hue, int saturation, int value> get hsv => ... and case {hsv: (saturation: 0, ...)}. Or an object, HsvColor get hsv => ... and case {hsv: {saturation: 0}}.

Nit: Those would be:

case (hsv: (_, 0, _): ...
case (hsv: (saturation: 0, ...)): ...

The fact that you can already do this to call class-defined transformation methods is a good observation. I still think user-defined extractor functions/methods look nicer and feel more natural, but this does make me feel like it's maybe not as valuable as it would be in other languages where you don't already have a pattern syntax for calling arbitrary getters.

[leafpetersen]

Going in the other direction removes, and potentially breaks, abstraction. That's bad, we don't want to encourage breaking abstraction.

I don't understand this. How does it break abstraction?

The point is that there is no need to introduce new destructuring features to allow classes to expose things in ways that are meaningful to them, they can already use a getter.

There is no need for multi-argument constructors either (or in fact single argument constructors, you can always just use a setter to initialize the fields after the fact). In the limit, the lambda calculus is enough, but I don't find these reductive arguments very useful. You need to talk about not just what is possible, but what the actual developer affordances look and feel like.

[lrhn]

A destructor ca neither provide no information which isn't already available through getters (in which case I think the destructor isn't really necessary because we have getter matching patterns), or it can provide information that isn't otherwise available, in which case I consider it breaking the abstraction. Alternatively, the destructuring is considered part of the abstraction itself, another feature of the class, another way to inspect the class, but then I want it to fit into the abstraction, and have a meaning other that "provide properties as a tuple". And then I think it should just be a named getter too.

Destructuring is, in some way, a projection of the object state onto another state space. If the only thing that other state has going for it is that it's easy to write patterns against, then it feels like an implementation detail, and not something the class author would write by themselves. If the new state has a meaning by itself, like a HSV color, then it's a perfectly reasonable part of the abstraction, and should be there whether we had destructors or not. It's something we'd already have an asFoo() or toFoo() method doing (which is the one reason I'd be willing to actually pattern match against method calls, at least ones with constant arguments).

I think we already have the affordances that destructors would give. I don't think they will make patterns much shorter or easier to write than just doing getter matching. They are a new concept, one which has no reason to exist other than as a an affordance for pattern matching, and I'm not convinced that affordance is much of a win, if any.

[leafpetersen]

A destructor ca neither provide no information which isn't already available through getters (in which case I think the destructor isn't really necessary because we have getter matching patterns), or it can provide information that isn't otherwise available, in which case I consider it breaking the abstraction.

This is where you're really losing me. I can, write now, add a method to a class which "destructs it" into some set of properties bundled as a class. For example, given a Point class, represented using cartesian coordinates:

• I can write a method which returns a PolarPoint. In what way is this breaking the abstraction?
• If it's not, then, supposing I have tuples, I can write exactly the same method, which returns a tuple of integers which describes the polar representation of the point. Is this breaking the abstraction? Why, if the PolarPoint is not?
• If it's not, then I can project out the two elements of that tuple using getters. Is that breaking the abstraction? Why?
• If that's not, then I can instead use pattern matching to destruct that tuple instead of getters. Is that breaking the abstraction? Why?

An extractor is just the composition of the steps I described above. If you believe that one of those steps breaks the abstraction, you need to explain to me in what sense it does so, because I don't see how any of those steps break any abstraction.

And then I think it should just be a named getter too.

Why?

Destructuring is, in some way, a projection of the object state onto another state space. If the only thing that other state has going for it is that it's easy to write patterns against, then it feels like an implementation detail, and not something the class author would write by themselves.

I really don't understand this. Suppose I am a class author, and I am writing a collection. Aha! I say, I will make it easy for users to map a function over this collection. So I will write a map method! But no, you say: the only thing a map method has going for it is that it makes it easy to write maps over the collection. Users can already do that, that's what for loops are for! This is an implementation detail, and not something the class author should write themselves!

In other words, when designing a class, authors often think about what affordances they want to provide to users of those classes. They may feel that providing specific iteration methods is useful. They may feel that providing transformation methods (asFoo) is useful. They may also feel that providing specific forms of destructuring will be useful to consumers of those classes. None of those things are necessary, assuming that they have exposed the appropriate getters. You can already do all of that. But these affordances allow class authors to design an API which is elegant and pleasant to use. So arguing that "the user can already do that" doesn't seem to really add much value.

Or to put another way, whether you want class authors to think about this or not, they will. That is, if they must use the getter as you suggest above, then they still have to think about exactly the same concerns with exactly the same motivations, it's just a question of what syntax they use, right? Am I missing something?

[leafpetersen]

• If the return type of the method is non-nullable, then the extractor will always match, so this extract() method can be used as a binder pattern. If the return type is nullable, it can only be used as a matcher pattern.

@munificent I don't understand this paragraph. There's nothing here that statically says that the return value will match the sub-pattern, right? So I don't think I understand how this can ever be a binder (irrefutable) pattern. Or am I missing/confusing something?

[leafpetersen]

The fact that you can already do this to call class-defined transformation methods is a good observation. I still thing user-defined extractor functions/methods look nicer and feel more natural, but this does make me feel like it's maybe not as valuable as it would be in other languages where you don't already have a pattern syntax for calling arbitrary getters.

@munificent I'm a bit confused. I agree that the example that you and @lrhn are using here can be expressed this way, but it doesn't match the description in the header. Has the proposal drifted somewhere? Specifically, given:

Resolve the name on the extractor pattern to a type. If the name resolves to a type that declares a static method named extract() then:

I would expect your example to look more like:

describeColor(Description c) {
switch (c)
  case Color(0, 0, 0): print('Black');
  case Color(255, 255, 255): print('White');
  case Color.hsv(_, 0, _): print('Monochrome'); // Not sure about this?
  case Color.hsv(hue, _, _) if (hue > 80 && hue < 140): print('Greenish'); // Also not sure about this?
  // Etc.
}

The point is that part of the value here is that this is a way of programming the type extractor, so that in general you can do:

doSomething(Expression e) {
 switch (e) {
    case UnaryOperator(var oper, var b) => ...
    case BinaryOperator(var a, var oper, var b) => // do Stuff here
    ...
  }

and have the individual cases for the subclasses (BinaryOperator here) define custom destructuring logic.

If I understand the suggestion from @lrhn , you would instead write this as:

doSomething(Expression e) {
 switch (e) {
   case UnaryOperator(extract: (var oper, var b)) => ...
   case BinaryOperator(extract: (var a, var oper, var b)) => // do Stuff here
    ...
  }

Is that right? One nice thing about this suggestion is that it gives you "named" destructors for free. That is, I can instead choose to structure my hierarchically with a single Operator subclass with different destructor getters and write this as:

doSomething(Expression e) {
 switch (e) {
    case Operator(unary: (var oper, var b)) => // do Stuff here
    case Operator(binary: (var a, var oper, var b)) => // do Stuff here
    ...
  }

which is not... terrible.

[munificent]

• If the return type of the method is non-nullable, then the extractor will always match, so this extract() method can be used as a binder pattern. If the return type is nullable, it can only be used as a matcher pattern.

@munificent I don't understand this paragraph. There's nothing here that statically says that the return value will match the sub-pattern, right? So I don't think I understand how this can ever be a binder (irrefutable) pattern. Or am I missing/confusing something?

The previous paragraph has:

The method must take a single positional parameter. It is a compile-time error if the static type of the value being matched is not a subtype of the parameter's type.

Here's a concrete example of how this could be used:

class Color {
  final int r, g, b;

  Color(this.r, this.g, this.b);
}

class HsvColor {
  final int h, s, v;

  static HsvColor extract(Color color) { // <-- Extractor.
    // RGB to HSV conversion...
    return HsvColor(h, s, v);
  }

  HsvColor(this.h, this.s, this.v);
}

void showHsv(Color color) {
  var HsvColor(h: h, s: s, v: v) = color; // <-- Invoke as binder.
  print('h:$h, s:$s, v:$v');
}

Has the proposal drifted somewhere?

Yes, sorry, my previous Color example hypothesizes another kind of extractor (free-floating functions) and also just has a bug. Here's my initial code, with some remarks:

class Color {
  final int red, green, blue;

  Color(this.red, this.green, this.blue);

  // vvv This is the proposal in the initial issue comment.
  static (int, int, int) extract() => (red, green, blue);
}

//     These two functions are hypothesized extensions to also allow extractor
// vvv patterns to refer to top-level functions.
(int, int, int) hsv(Color c) =>
    // Convert RGB to HSV and return tuple...

(int, int, int) lab(Color c) =>
    // Convert RGB to Lab and return tuple...
Then users could write code like:

describeColor(Color c) {
  // vvv These two lines are just bugs because rgb() isn't defined anywhere.
  // vvv Instead of "rgb", these should say "Color".
  case rgb(0, 0, 0): print('Black');
  case rgb(255, 255, 255): print('White');

  // vvv These are using the hypothesized free-floating function extractors.
  case hsv(_, 0, _): print('Monochrome');
  case hsv(hue, _, _) if (hue > 80 && hue < 140): print('Greenish');
}

For the last two hsv() patterns here, the behavior is:

1. Resolve the extractor identifier hsv. That resolves to a top-level function hsv().
2. Pass the matched value as an argument to the function.
3. Take the value the function returns and apply the remaining record pattern to that value. In the first pattern, that's (_, 0, _) which is matched against the tuple returned by hsv().

Sorry for the confusion. Does that clarify?

Basically, you can think of an extractor pattern as two steps:

1. A named transformation. The identifier is resolved to something. We take that thing and give it the original matched value. That thing can then transform it in some way and potentially yield a different value.

   The behavior in the original proposal is that the name must resolve to a class and the transformation logic is "if the matched value is an instance of that class, just yield the same value (but as that type), otherwise fail the match".

   In my sketch in the description on this issue, we extend that to say if the name resolves to a type and there's a static method named extract() on that type, then the transformation logic is to pass the matched value to the method, and yield the result it returns.

2. Then take whatever value got yielded and match the rest of the extractor pattern against it. The "rest of the pattern" is syntactically and semantically just a record pattern with all of the existing behavior those support for destructuring named getters and positional fields.

[Levi-Lesches]

@munificent I've always learned that when you have a static method that takes an instance of the surrounding class MyClass.myFunc(MyClass instance), you just make that into an instance function myInstance.myFunc()

Would it be better to have, instead of declaring a static extract(MyClass instance) function, to have MyClass implement a Destructurable interface that has an extract() member? That way it's obvious when a class opts in to this behavior and it can be tested with MyClass is Destructurable.

[lrhn]

Or make extract an extension member on Color:

class HsvColor { ... }
extension ExtractHsv on Color {
  HsvColor asHsv() => ....;
  // or, depending on perspective:
  HsvColor toHsv() => ....;
}

and pattern match as

case {asHsv(): {h: 0, s: 0, v: 0}}: ...

If the asHsv() method call isn't allowed, we can make it a getter instead, but traditionally asX methods have been methods.

[TimWhiting]

Currently with extension methods we can already cover most of this proposal, in what I think is an intuitive manner:

describeColor(Description c) {
switch (c)
  case Color(rgb: (0, 0, 0)): print('Black');
  case Color(rgb: (255, 255, 255)): print('White');
  case Color(hsv: (_, 0, _)): print('Monochrome'); // Not sure about this?
  case Color(hsv: (hue, _, _)) if (hue > 80 && hue < 140): print('Greenish'); // Also not sure about this?
  // Etc.
}

extension on Color {
  (int, int, int) get rgb => (red, green, blue);
  (int, int, int) get hsv {
    final color = toHsv();
    return (color.hue, color.saturation, color.value);
  }
}

I've used this already for translating some Scala code that uses a lot of unapply methods, and I think it is a great solution so far. The only thing this proposal gets you over that is to maybe have it look more like you are destructuring a different factory constructor interface, which I think is a good usability improvement as far as syntax overhead, but probably not worth the implementation effort relative to other features that are desired. (Personally, I'd rather see #2433 prioritized over this).

However, this solution could use some documentation / official adoption of this pattern as the recommended solution to the user defined destructuring problem.