PartialEq and Eq

Partial equality & Total equality.

Derivable: ✅

When to implement: Almost always.

#![allow(unused)]
fn main() {
// pub trait PartialEq<Rhs = Self>
//{
//    // Required method
//     fn eq(&self, other: &Rhs) -> bool;
// 
//     // Provided method
//     fn ne(&self, other: &Rhs) -> bool { ... }
// }
//
// pub trait Eq: PartialEq { }

#[derive(PartialEq, Eq)]
pub struct User { name: String, favorite_number: i32 }

let alice = User { name: "alice".to_string(), favorite_number: 1_000_042 };
let bob = User { name: "bob".to_string(), favorite_number: 42 };

dbg!(alice == alice);
dbg!(alice == bob);
}
- Equality-related methods. If a type implements `PartialEq`/`Eq` then you can use the `==` operator with that type.

  • A type can’t implement Eq without implementing PartialEq.

  • Reminder: Partial means “there are invalid members of this set for this function.”

    This doesn’t mean that equality will panic, or that it returns a result, just that there may be values that may not behave as you expect equality to behave.

    For example, with floating point values NaN is an outlier: NaN == NaN is false, despite bitwise equality.

    PartialEq exists to separate types like f32/f64 from types with Total Equality.

  • You can implement PartialEq between different types, but this is mostly useful for reference/smart pointer types.