Does Rust have an equivalent to Python's dictionary comprehension syntax? - rust

Question

How would one translate the following Python, in which several files are read and their contents are used as values to a dictionary (with filename as key), to Rust?
countries = {region: open("{}.txt".format(region)).read() for region in ["canada", "usa", "mexico"]}
My attempt is shown below, but I was wondering if a one-line, idiomatic solution is possible.
use std::{
fs::File,
io::{prelude::*, BufReader},
path::Path,
collections::HashMap,
};
macro_rules! map(
{ $($key:expr => $value:expr),+ } => {
{
let mut m = HashMap::new();
$(
m.insert($key, $value);
)+
m
}
};
);
fn lines_from_file<P>(filename: P) -> Vec<String>
where
P: AsRef<Path>,
{
let file = File::open(filename).expect("no such file");
let buf = BufReader::new(file);
buf.lines()
.map(|l| l.expect("Could not parse line"))
.collect()
}
fn main() {
let _countries = map!{ "canada" => lines_from_file("canada.txt"),
"usa" => lines_from_file("usa.txt"),
"mexico" => lines_from_file("mexico.txt") };
}

Answer 1

Rust's iterators have map/filter/collect methods which are enough to do anything Python's comprehensions can. You can create a HashMap with collect on an iterator of pairs, but collect can return various types of collections, so you may have to specify the type you want.
For example,
use std::collections::HashMap;
fn main() {
println!(
"{:?}",
(1..5).map(|i| (i + i, i * i)).collect::<HashMap<_, _>>()
);
}
Is roughly equivalent to the Python
print({i+i: i*i for i in range(1, 5)})
But translated very literally, it's actually closer to
from builtins import dict
def main():
print("{!r}".format(dict(map(lambda i: (i+i, i*i), range(1, 5)))))
if __name__ == "__main__":
main()
not that you would ever say it that way in Python.

Answer 2

Python's comprehensions are just sugar for a for loop and accumulator. Rust has macros--you can make any sugar you want.
Take this simple Python example,
print({i+i: i*i for i in range(1, 5)})
You could easily re-write this as a loop and accumulator:
map = {}
for i in range(1, 5):
map[i+i] = i*i
print(map)
You could do it basically the same way in Rust.
use std::collections::HashMap;
fn main() {
let mut hm = HashMap::new();
for i in 1..5 {
hm.insert(i + i, i * i);
}
println!("{:?}", hm);
}
You can use a macro to do the rewriting to this form for you.
use std::collections::HashMap;
macro_rules! hashcomp {
($name:ident = $k:expr => $v:expr; for $i:ident in $itr:expr) => {
let mut $name = HashMap::new();
for $i in $itr {
$name.insert($k, $v);
}
};
}
When you use it, the resulting code is much more compact. And this choice of separator tokens makes it resemble the Python.
fn main() {
hashcomp!(hm = i+i => i*i; for i in 1..5);
println!("{:?}", hm);
}
This is just a basic example that can handle a single loop. Python's comprehensions also can have filters and additional loops, but a more advanced macro could probably do that too.

Answer 3

Without using your own macros I think the closest to
countries = {region: open("{}.txt".format(region)).read() for region in ["canada", "usa", "mexico"]}
in Rust would be
let countries: HashMap<_, _> = ["canada", "usa", "mexico"].iter().map(|&c| {(c,read_to_string(c.to_owned() + ".txt").expect("Error reading file"),)}).collect();
but running a formatter, will make it more readable:
let countries: HashMap<_, _> = ["canada", "usa", "mexico"]
.iter()
.map(|&c| {
(
c,
read_to_string(c.to_owned() + ".txt").expect("Error reading file"),
)
})
.collect();
A few notes:
To map a vector, you need to transform it into an iterator, thus iter().map(...).
To transform an iterator back into a tangible data structure, e.g. a HashMap (dict), use .collect(). This is the advantage and pain of Rust, it is very strict with types, no unexpected conversions.
A complete test program:
use std::collections::HashMap;
use std::fs::{read_to_string, File};
use std::io::Write;
fn create_files() -> std::io::Result<()> {
let regios = [
("canada", "Ottawa"),
("usa", "Washington"),
("mexico", "Mexico city"),
];
for (country, capital) in regios {
let mut file = File::create(country.to_owned() + ".txt")?;
file.write_fmt(format_args!("The capital of {} is {}", country, capital))?;
}
Ok(())
}
fn create_hashmap() -> HashMap<&'static str, String> {
let countries = ["canada", "usa", "mexico"]
.iter()
.map(|&c| {
(
c,
read_to_string(c.to_owned() + ".txt").expect("Error reading file"),
)
})
.collect();
countries
}
fn main() -> std::io::Result<()> {
println!("Hello, world!");
create_files().expect("Failed to create files");
let countries = create_hashmap();
{
println!("{:#?}", countries);
}
std::io::Result::Ok(())
}
Not that specifying the type of countries is not needed here, because the return type of create_hashmap() is defined.