impl<A> Allocator for &mut A

[sarah-quinones]

Proposal

add an Allocator impl for &mut A when A: ?Sized + Allocator that forwards to the underlying implementation

Problem statement

&mut A currently doesn't impl Allocator when A does

Motivating examples or use cases

the current state of things makes it cumbersome to work with Send allocators (especially type erased dyn 'a + Send + Allocator). examples of allocators that are Send, but not Sync are local allocators that wrap a RefCell to satisfy the immutable ref api.

Solution sketch

we can just copy the &A implementation

unsafe impl<A> Allocator for &mut A
where
    A: Allocator + ?Sized,
{
    #[inline]
    fn allocate(&self, layout: Layout) -> Result<NonNull<[u8]>, AllocError> {
        (**self).allocate(layout)
    }

    #[inline]
    fn allocate_zeroed(&self, layout: Layout) -> Result<NonNull<[u8]>, AllocError> {
        (**self).allocate_zeroed(layout)
    }

    #[inline]
    unsafe fn deallocate(&self, ptr: NonNull<u8>, layout: Layout) {
        // SAFETY: the safety contract must be upheld by the caller
        unsafe { (**self).deallocate(ptr, layout) }
    }

    #[inline]
    unsafe fn grow(
        &self,
        ptr: NonNull<u8>,
        old_layout: Layout,
        new_layout: Layout,
    ) -> Result<NonNull<[u8]>, AllocError> {
        // SAFETY: the safety contract must be upheld by the caller
        unsafe { (**self).grow(ptr, old_layout, new_layout) }
    }

    #[inline]
    unsafe fn grow_zeroed(
        &self,
        ptr: NonNull<u8>,
        old_layout: Layout,
        new_layout: Layout,
    ) -> Result<NonNull<[u8]>, AllocError> {
        // SAFETY: the safety contract must be upheld by the caller
        unsafe { (**self).grow_zeroed(ptr, old_layout, new_layout) }
    }

    #[inline]
    unsafe fn shrink(
        &self,
        ptr: NonNull<u8>,
        old_layout: Layout,
        new_layout: Layout,
    ) -> Result<NonNull<[u8]>, AllocError> {
        // SAFETY: the safety contract must be upheld by the caller
        unsafe { (**self).shrink(ptr, old_layout, new_layout) }
    }
}

Alternatives

an alternative solution is using a ByMut<A> wrapper that's a thin wrapper over &mut A, but this is an unnecessary hoop to make users jump through