Proposal to change return type of shift to Nothing

[roomscape]

The shift function in EffectScope and EagerEffectScope is currently declared as

suspend fun <B> shift(r: R): B

Instead it could be declared as

suspend fun shift(r: R): Nothing

Initially proposed in the #kotlinlang Slack.

Benefits

Using Nothing would:

• Take advantage of the type system to convey information about the behaviour of the function
• Allow the IDE to warn about unreachable code after a call to shift
• Allow smart-casting after a call to shift
• Remove the need to specify a type argument in some cases where omitting it would currently be a compile error

Minimal example that does not compile before the change, but would compile after the change:

val result: Either<String, Int> = either.eager {
    shift("Not an int") // Not enough information to infer type variable B
    1
}

Example of a missed opportunity for a smart cast:

val result: Either<String, Int> = either.eager {
    val x: String? = null
    if (x == null) shift<Any>("Not an int")
    x.toInt() // Only safe (?.) or non-null asserted (!!.) calls are allowed on a nullable receiver of type String?
}

Comparison with standard library

Nothing is used in a few places in standard Kotlin functions, notably:

• error: fun error(message: Any): Nothing
• TODO: fun TODO(): Nothing

There are also examples of bottom/empty types that don't use Nothing, e.g:

• emptyList fun <T> emptyList(): List<T>

The semantics of shift make it more similar to functions like error, so it would be idiomatic to use Nothing here.

Compatibility

• ✅ Nothing is assignable to any type, so any code that uses the return value from shift would continue to compile.
• ℹ️ A new warning would be introduced because code after a call to shift would be identified as unreachable. This could be a breaking change for anyone using the -Werror compiler flag.
• ❌ Breaking change: calling shift with an explicit generic type, e.g. shift<Nothing>(), would become a compile error when it wasn't before.

[serras]

Closed by #2839