Testcase: List - Rust By Example
Description: A description

# Testcase: List

Implementing `fmt::Display` for a structure where the elements must each be handled sequentially is tricky. The problem is that each `write!` generates a `fmt::Result`. Proper handling of this requires dealing with all the results. Rust provides the `?` operator for exactly this purpose.

Using `?` on `write!` looks like this:

    // Try `write!` to see if it errors. If it errors, return
    // the error. Otherwise continue.
    write!(f, "{}", value)?;

Alternatively, you can also use the `try!` macro, which works the same way. This is a bit more verbose and no longer recommended, but you may still see it in older Rust code. Using `try!` looks like this:

    try!(write!(f, "{}", value));

With `?` available, implementing `fmt::Display` for a `Vec` is straightforward:

    use std::fmt; // Import the `fmt` module.

    // Define a structure named `List` containing a `Vec`.
    struct List(Vec<i32>);

    impl fmt::Display for List {
        fn fmt(&self, f: &mut fmt::Formatter) -> fmt::Result {
            // Extract the value using tuple indexing,
            // and create a reference to `vec`.
            let vec = &self.0;

            write!(f, "[")?;

            // Iterate over `v` in `vec` while enumerating the iteration
            // count in `count`.
            for (count, v) in vec.iter().enumerate() {
                // For every element except the first, add a comma.
                // Use the ? operator, or try!, to return on errors.
                if count != 0 { write!(f, ", ")?; }
                write!(f, "{}", v)?;
            }

            // Close the opened bracket and return a fmt::Result value.
            write!(f, "]")
        }
    }

    fn main() {
        let v = List(vec![1, 2, 3]);
        println!("{}", v);
    }

### Activity

Try changing the program so that the index of each element in the vector is also printed. The new output should look like this:

    [0: 1, 1: 2, 2: 3]

### See also:

`for`, `ref`, `Result`, `struct`, `?`, and `vec!`