rust-lang / rust-lang/reference

Basic arithmetic without overflow-checks undocumented

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Language Cleanup
Dominant language
Rust
Stars
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Forks
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PR merge metrics
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Description

It is documented what the semantics are of basic arithmetic when overflow-checks is turned on: https://doc.rust-lang.org/reference/expressions/operator-expr.html#overflow.

However as far as I can see it is nowhere actually specified what arithmetic is supposed to do when overflow-checks is turned off, or whether this is subject to change, hardware specifics, etc.

Contributor guide

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First steps

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  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start with the Rust Reference's expressions/operator-expr.html#overflow section and review how it documents arithmetic with overflow-checks enabled. Investigate the missing behavior when checks are disabled, including whether it is stable or hardware-specific. Done means the Reference clearly specifies the disabled-check semantics and their stability or platform limitations.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
rust
Domain
documentation
Issue type
Documentation
Difficulty
3/5
Estimated time
1-2 days
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
45/100

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