Bringing Paths into Scope with the use Keyword

Having to write out the paths to call functions can feel inconvenient and repetitive. Fortunately, there’s a way to simplify this process: we can create a shortcut to a path with the use keyword once, and then use the shorter name everywhere else in the scope.

In Listing 7-7, we bring the crate::front_of_house::hosting module into the scope of the eat_at_restaurant function so we only have to specify hosting::add_to_waitlist to call the add_to_waitlist function in eat_at_restaurant.

Filename: src/lib.cairo

// section "Defining Modules to Control Scope"

mod front_of_house {
    pub mod hosting {
        pub fn add_to_waitlist() {}
    }
}

use crate::front_of_house::hosting;

pub fn eat_at_restaurant() {
    hosting::add_to_waitlist(); // ✅ Shorter path
}

Listing 7-7: Bringing a module into scope with use

Adding use and a path in a scope is similar to creating a symbolic link in the filesystem. By adding use crate::front_of_house::hosting; in the crate root, hosting is now a valid name in that scope, just as though the hosting module had been defined in the crate root.

Note that use only creates the shortcut for the particular scope in which the use occurs. Listing 7-8 moves the eat_at_restaurant function into a new child module named customer, which is then a different scope than the use statement, so the function body won’t compile:

Filename: src/lib.cairo

mod front_of_house {
    pub mod hosting {
        pub fn add_to_waitlist() {}
    }
}

use crate::front_of_house::hosting;

mod customer {
    pub fn eat_at_restaurant() {
        hosting::add_to_waitlist();
    }
}

Listing 7-8: A use statement only applies in the scope it’s in.

The compiler error shows that the shortcut no longer applies within the customer module:

$ scarb build 
   Compiling listing_07_05 v0.1.0 (listings/ch07-managing-cairo-projects-with-packages-crates-and-modules/listing_07_use_and_scope/Scarb.toml)
warn: Unused import: `listing_07_05::hosting`
 --> listings/ch07-managing-cairo-projects-with-packages-crates-and-modules/listing_07_use_and_scope/src/lib.cairo:10:28
use crate::front_of_house::hosting;
                           ^*****^

error: Identifier not found.
 --> listings/ch07-managing-cairo-projects-with-packages-crates-and-modules/listing_07_use_and_scope/src/lib.cairo:14:9
        hosting::add_to_waitlist();
        ^*****^

error: could not compile `listing_07_05` due to previous error

Creating Idiomatic use Paths

In Listing 7-7, you might have wondered why we specified use crate::front_of_house::hosting and then called hosting::add_to_waitlist in eat_at_restaurant rather than specifying the use path all the way out to the add_to_waitlist function to achieve the same result, as in Listing 7-9.

Filename: src/lib.cairo

mod front_of_house {
    pub mod hosting {
        pub fn add_to_waitlist() {}
    }
}

use crate::front_of_house::hosting::add_to_waitlist;

pub fn eat_at_restaurant() {
    add_to_waitlist();
}

Listing 7-9: Bringing the add_to_waitlist function into scope with use, which is unidiomatic

Although both Listing 7-7 and 7-9 accomplish the same task, Listing 7-7 is the idiomatic way to bring a function into scope with use. Bringing the function’s parent module into scope with use means we have to specify the parent module when calling the function. Specifying the parent module when calling the function makes it clear that the function isn’t locally defined while still minimizing repetition of the full path. The code in Listing 7-9 is unclear as to where add_to_waitlist is defined.

On the other hand, when bringing in structs, enums, traits, and other items with use, it’s idiomatic to specify the full path. Listing 7-10 shows the idiomatic way to bring the core library’s BitSize trait into the scope, allowing to call bits method to retrieve the size in bits of a type.

use core::num::traits::BitSize;

fn main() {
    let u8_size: usize = BitSize::<u8>::bits();
    println!("A u8 variable has {} bits", u8_size)
}

Listing 7-10: Bringing BitSize trait into scope in an idiomatic way

There’s no strong reason behind this idiom: it’s just the convention that has emerged in the Rust community, and folks have gotten used to reading and writing Rust code this way. As Cairo shares many idioms with Rust, we follow this convention as well.

The exception to this idiom is if we’re bringing two items with the same name into scope with use statements, because Cairo doesn’t allow that.

Providing New Names with the as Keyword

There’s another solution to the problem of bringing two types of the same name into the same scope with use: after the path, we can specify as and a new local name, or alias, for the type. Listing 7-11 shows how you can rename an import with as:

Filename: src/lib.cairo

use core::array::ArrayTrait as Arr;

fn main() {
    let mut arr = Arr::new(); // ArrayTrait was renamed to Arr
    arr.append(1);
}

Listing 7-11: Renaming a trait when it’s brought into scope with the as keyword

Here, we brought ArrayTrait into scope with the alias Arr. We can now access the trait's methods with the Arr identifier.

Importing Multiple Items from the Same Module

When you want to import multiple items (like functions, structs or enums) from the same module in Cairo, you can use curly braces {} to list all of the items that you want to import. This helps to keep your code clean and easy to read by avoiding a long list of individual use statements.

The general syntax for importing multiple items from the same module is:

use module::{item1, item2, item3};

Here is an example where we import three structures from the same module:

// Assuming we have a module called `shapes` with the structures `Square`, `Circle`, and `Triangle`.
mod shapes {
    #[derive(Drop)]
    pub struct Square {
        pub side: u32,
    }

    #[derive(Drop)]
    pub struct Circle {
        pub radius: u32,
    }

    #[derive(Drop)]
    pub struct Triangle {
        pub base: u32,
        pub height: u32,
    }
}

// We can import the structures `Square`, `Circle`, and `Triangle` from the `shapes` module like
// this:
use shapes::{Square, Circle, Triangle};

// Now we can directly use `Square`, `Circle`, and `Triangle` in our code.
fn main() {
    let sq = Square { side: 5 };
    let cr = Circle { radius: 3 };
    let tr = Triangle { base: 5, height: 2 };
    // ...
}

Listing 7-12: Importing multiple items from the same module

Re-exporting Names in Module Files

When we bring a name into scope with the use keyword, the name available in the new scope can be imported as if it had been defined in that code’s scope. This technique is called re-exporting because we’re bringing an item into scope, but also making that item available for others to bring into their scope, with the pub keyword.

For example, let's re-export the add_to_waitlist function in the restaurant example:

Filename: src/lib.cairo

mod front_of_house {
    pub mod hosting {
        pub fn add_to_waitlist() {}
    }
}

pub use crate::front_of_house::hosting;

fn eat_at_restaurant() {
    hosting::add_to_waitlist();
}

Listing 7-13: Making a name available for any code to use from a new scope with pub use

Before this change, external code would have to call the add_to_waitlist function by using the path restaurant::front_of_house::hosting::add_to_waitlist(). Now that this pub use has re-exported the hosting module from the root module, external code can now use the path restaurant::hosting::add_to_waitlist() instead.

Re-exporting is useful when the internal structure of your code is different from how programmers calling your code would think about the domain. For example, in this restaurant metaphor, the people running the restaurant think about “front of house” and “back of house.” But customers visiting a restaurant probably won’t think about the parts of the restaurant in those terms. With pub use, we can write our code with one structure but expose a different structure. Doing so makes our library well organized for programmers working on the library and programmers calling the library.

Using External Packages in Cairo with Scarb

You might need to use external packages to leverage the functionality provided by the community. Scarb allows you to use dependencies by cloning packages from their Git repositories. To use an external package in your project with Scarb, simply declare the Git repository URL of the dependency you want to add in a dedicated [dependencies] section in your Scarb.toml configuration file. Note that the URL might correspond to the main branch, or any specific commit, branch or tag. For this, you will have to pass an extra rev, branch, or tag field, respectively. For example, the following code imports the main branch of alexandria_math crate from alexandria package:

[dependencies]
alexandria_math = { git = "https://github.com/keep-starknet-strange/alexandria.git" }

while the following code imports a specific branch (which is deprecated and should not be used):

[dependencies]
alexandria_math = { git = "https://github.com/keep-starknet-strange/alexandria.git", branch = "cairo-v2.3.0-rc0" }

If you want to import multiple packages in your project, you need to create only one [dependencies] section and list all the desired packages beneath it. You can also specify development dependencies by declaring a [dev-dependencies] section.

After that, simply run scarb build to fetch all external dependencies and compile your package with all the dependencies included.

Note that it is also possible to add dependencies with the scarb add command, which will automatically edit the Scarb.toml file for you. For development dependencies, just use the scarb add --dev command.

To remove a dependency, simply remove the corresponding line from your Scarb.toml file, or use the scarb rm command.

The Glob Operator

If we want to bring all public items defined in a path into scope, we can specify that path followed by the * glob operator:

#![allow(unused)]
fn main() {
use core::num::traits::*;
}

This use statement brings all public items defined in core::num::traits into the current scope. Be careful when using the glob operator! Glob can make it harder to tell what names are in scope and where a name used in your program was defined.

The glob operator is often used when testing to bring everything under test into the tests module; we’ll talk about that in the “How to Write Tests” section in Chapter 10.