@@ -116,6 +116,8 @@ mod prim_bool { }
116116///
117117/// # `!` and generics
118118///
119+ /// ## Infallible errors
120+ ///
119121/// The main place you'll see `!` used explicitly is in generic code. Consider the [`FromStr`]
120122/// trait:
121123///
@@ -144,9 +146,60 @@ mod prim_bool { }
144146/// [`Ok`] variant. This illustrates another behaviour of `!` - it can be used to "delete" certain
145147/// enum variants from generic types like `Result`.
146148///
149+ /// ## Infinite loops
150+ ///
151+ /// While [`Result<T, !>`] is very useful for removing errors, `!` can also be used to remove
152+ /// successes as well. If we think of [`Result<T, !>`] as "if this function returns, it has not
153+ /// errored," we get a very intuitive idea of [`Result<!, E>`] as well: if the function returns, it
154+ /// *has* errored.
155+ ///
156+ /// For example, consider the case of a simple web server, which can be simplified to:
157+ ///
158+ /// ```ignore (hypothetical-example)
159+ /// loop {
160+ /// let (client, request) = get_request().expect("disconnected");
161+ /// let response = request.process();
162+ /// response.send(client);
163+ /// }
164+ /// ```
165+ ///
166+ /// Currently, this isn't ideal, because we simply panic whenever we fail to get a new connection.
167+ /// Instead, we'd like to keep track of this error, like this:
168+ ///
169+ /// ```ignore (hypothetical-example)
170+ /// loop {
171+ /// match get_request() {
172+ /// Err(err) => break err,
173+ /// Ok((client, request)) => {
174+ /// let response = request.process();
175+ /// response.send(client);
176+ /// },
177+ /// }
178+ /// }
179+ /// ```
180+ ///
181+ /// Now, when the server disconnects, we exit the loop with an error instead of panicking. While it
182+ /// might be intuitive to simply return the error, we might want to wrap it in a [`Result<!, E>`]
183+ /// instead:
184+ ///
185+ /// ```ignore (hypothetical-example)
186+ /// fn server_loop() -> Result<!, ConnectionError> {
187+ /// loop {
188+ /// let (client, request) = get_request()?;
189+ /// let response = request.process();
190+ /// response.send(client);
191+ /// }
192+ /// }
193+ /// ```
194+ ///
195+ /// Now, we can use `?` instead of `match`, and the return type makes a lot more sense: if the loop
196+ /// ever stops, it means that an error occurred. We don't even have to wrap the loop in an `Ok`
197+ /// because `!` coerces to `Result<!, ConnectionError>` automatically.
198+ ///
147199/// [`String::from_str`]: str/trait.FromStr.html#tymethod.from_str
148200/// [`Result<String, !>`]: result/enum.Result.html
149201/// [`Result<T, !>`]: result/enum.Result.html
202+ /// [`Result<!, E>`]: result/enum.Result.html
150203/// [`Ok`]: result/enum.Result.html#variant.Ok
151204/// [`String`]: string/struct.String.html
152205/// [`Err`]: result/enum.Result.html#variant.Err
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