string length type inconsistency

[asmaloney]

Godot version

4.2

godot-cpp version

4.2-stable

System information

macOS (but it's irrelevant)

Issue description

In the test code:

String Example::test_string_resize(String p_string) const {
	int orig_len = p_string.length();
	p_string.resize(orig_len + 3);
...

String::length() returns an int64_t, but String::resize() only takes an int:

Error resize(int p_size);

When dealing with string sizes, the type should be consistent throughout the class. In fact I would recommend creating a type for it so it's obvious when we're dealing with lengths. Something like:

using StringLen = int64_t;

StringLen length() const;
Error resize(StringLen p_size);

Steps to reproduce

(It's an API bug.)

Minimal reproduction project

(It's in the test code: test/src/example.cpp - Example::test_string_resize)

[AThousandShips]

I'd say length should return int here as well, to match the API, this is likely due to a limitation in the implementation (resize is actually added manually in the bindings generator). String::length in the engine returns int, as does the godot-cpp CharStringT

The underlying data container only handles 32 bit lengths, so the change here shouldn't be in the argument, but the return type, but in either case I'd say this breaks compatibility

Generally I think this could be solved if the arguments of Variant types employed the meta data information, so it correctly conveyed the type and signedness of the arguments

[dsnopek]

I'd say length should return int here as well, to match the API, this is likely due to a limitation in the implementation (resize is actually added manually in the bindings generator). String::length in the engine returns int, as does the godot-cpp CharStringT
[...]
Generally I think this could be solved if the arguments of Variant types employed the meta data information, so it correctly conveyed the type and signedness of the arguments

I agree!

Godot does set "meta" in the JSON to "int32" or "int64" for some arguments and return types (for example, AnimatedSprite3D::set_frame() and AnimatedSprite3D::get_frame()), but it doesn't in the case of String::length() for some reason.

Perhaps it's because the variant types are handled a little differently than the ClassDB types?

[AThousandShips]

The variant types don't get any meta at all, this also affects the documentation currently, don't know if work is being done on fixing this, it's due to a different binding methodology

[dsnopek]

Fixed by PR #1357