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Allow lambda capture of immutable val fields from mutable class instances#1707

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copilot/fix-capture-restriction-issue
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Allow lambda capture of immutable val fields from mutable class instances#1707
Copilot wants to merge 2 commits intomainfrom
copilot/fix-capture-restriction-issue

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Copilot AI commented Feb 18, 2026

AntiAliasing rejects lambdas that reference this.v when v is a val of immutable type, because this has mutable class type. The captured value is effectively immutable — the field cannot be reassigned and its type carries no mutable state.

case class A(val v: BigInt, var m: BigInt) {
  def f(): BigInt => BigInt = x => v // was rejected: "Illegal capturing of variables with mutable type: thiss"
}

Changes

  • isAccessedOnlyThroughImmutableFields(v, expr): New helper that walks the expression tree and returns true iff every occurrence of v is the receiver of a ClassSelector on a val field with immutable type. Direct variable uses or accesses through var/mutable-typed fields return false.
  • Modified captured variable computation in the Lambda case: variables of mutable type that pass the above check are excluded before dealiasing through env.targets, so they don't trigger the fatal error.
  • Added extraction/valid/ImmutableFieldCapture.scala test covering the reported scenario.

Existing rejection cases are unaffected — var field accesses (i1365a/b), array captures (i1365c), and illegal lambda effects (LambdaMutation) all correctly fail the isAccessedOnlyThroughImmutableFields check.

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Original prompt

This section details on the original issue you should resolve

<issue_title>Capture of this.v is too restrictive when v is a field of a mutable class this</issue_title>
<issue_description>example:

import stainless.collection.List
import stainless.lang.StaticChecks.*

object InternalMutationEx02 {
  case class A(val v: BigInt, var m: BigInt) { 
    def f(): BigInt => BigInt = x => v // stainless consider this.v to capture the mutable object this, even though v is immutable, because it is a field of a mutable object.
  }
}

this is currently rejected:

❯ stainless field_val_capture.scala
[  Info  ] Finished compiling                                       
[  Info  ] Preprocessing finished                                   
[  Info  ] Running phase AntiAliasing                               
[ Fatal  ] field_val_capture.scala:6:33: Illegal capturing of variables with mutable type: thiss
               def f(): BigInt => BigInt = x => v // stainless consider this.v to capture the mutable object this, even though v is immutable, because it is a field of a mutable object.
                                           ^^^^^^
[ Error  ] Stainless terminated with an error.
[ Error  ] Debug output is available in the file `stainless-stack-trace.txt`. If the crash is caused by Stainless, you may report your issue on https://github.com/epfl-lara/stainless/issues
[ Error  ] You may use --debug=stack to have the stack trace displayed in the output.

However, it should not consider that it captures the mutable this when we only access an immutable field whose type is immutable.</issue_description>

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…lds of immutable type

When a lambda captures `this.v` where `v` is an immutable (val) field of
immutable type (e.g. BigInt), the AntiAliasing phase should not reject it
even though `this` has a mutable class type. The captured value is
effectively immutable and cannot become stale.

Added isAccessedOnlyThroughImmutableFields helper function that checks
whether a variable of mutable type is only used through ClassSelector on
val fields whose types are also immutable. Variables passing this check
are excluded from the captured mutable variables set.

Fixes the issue where code like:
  case class A(val v: BigInt, var m: BigInt) {
    def f(): BigInt => BigInt = x => v
  }
was incorrectly rejected with "Illegal capturing of variables with
mutable type: thiss".

Co-authored-by: samuelchassot <14821693+samuelchassot@users.noreply.github.com>
Copilot AI changed the title [WIP] Fix capture of this.v in mutable class field Allow lambda capture of immutable val fields from mutable class instances Feb 18, 2026
Copilot AI requested a review from samuelchassot February 18, 2026 15:34
@samuelchassot samuelchassot marked this pull request as ready for review February 20, 2026 15:03
Copilot AI review requested due to automatic review settings February 20, 2026 15:03
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Pull request overview

Relaxes AntiAliasing’s lambda capture restrictions to permit capturing a mutable receiver (e.g., this) when it is only used to read val fields whose types are immutable, addressing the reported false positive when referencing this.v inside a lambda.

Changes:

  • Adjusted lambda capture computation in AntiAliasing to exempt certain mutable-typed variables when accessed only through immutable val fields of immutable type.
  • Added isAccessedOnlyThroughImmutableFields helper to validate the “safe access only” condition.
  • Added a new extraction benchmark (ImmutableFieldCapture.scala) covering the allowed capture scenario.

Reviewed changes

Copilot reviewed 2 out of 2 changed files in this pull request and generated 3 comments.

File Description
core/src/main/scala/stainless/extraction/imperative/AntiAliasing.scala Modifies captured-variable detection for lambdas and adds a helper to treat this.v-style accesses as safe.
frontends/benchmarks/extraction/valid/ImmutableFieldCapture.scala Adds a valid benchmark that exercises immutable val field capture from a mutable class instance.

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Comment on lines +888 to +895
val allVarsInBody = exprOps.variablesOf(body)
val safeVars = allVarsInBody.filter(v => isMutableType(v.tpe) && isAccessedOnlyThroughImmutableFields(v, body))
val captured = (allVarsInBody -- safeVars).flatMap { v =>
env.targets.get(v.toVal) match {
case Some(targets) => targets.map(_.receiver)
case None => Set(v)
}
}.filter(vd => isMutableType(vd.tpe)) -- aliasedParams.map(_.toVariable).toSet
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safeVars currently treats any mutable-typed variable as safe if it is only used as v.<valField> with immutable field type. This also includes reassignable variables (IsVar), which would make captures like var a: A; () => a.v pass the capture check even though a can change over time (not referentially transparent). Consider requiring !v.flags.contains(IsVar) (and/or checking isReferentiallyTransparent on the receiver) before classifying a variable as safe to capture.

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// fields whose types are also immutable (e.g., accessing a val BigInt field
// of a mutable class).
val allVarsInBody = exprOps.variablesOf(body)
val safeVars = allVarsInBody.filter(v => isMutableType(v.tpe) && isAccessedOnlyThroughImmutableFields(v, body))
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safeVars calls isAccessedOnlyThroughImmutableFields(v, body) once per variable in body, each time walking the full expression tree. In worst cases this is O(#vars × size(body)) per lambda. Consider a single traversal that accumulates (un)safe variables, or memoize results per variable for the current body, to keep AntiAliasing overhead predictable on large lambdas.

Suggested change
val safeVars = allVarsInBody.filter(v => isMutableType(v.tpe) && isAccessedOnlyThroughImmutableFields(v, body))
// Compute, with a single traversal, which variables are used in an unsafe way:
// - direct occurrence as a Variable, or
// - as receiver of a ClassSelector on a mutable or var field.
var directVars = Set.empty[Variable]
var badSelectorVars = Set.empty[Variable]
object lambdaVarUsageCollector extends ConcreteOOSelfTreeTraverser {
override def traverse(e: Expr): Unit = e match {
case cs @ ClassSelector(recv: Variable, _) =>
cs.field match {
case Some(vd) if !(vd.flags contains IsVar) && !isMutableType(vd.tpe) =>
() // allowed immutable val field; do not treat recv as a direct use
case _ =>
badSelectorVars += recv
}
case ClassSelector(recv, _) =>
// Non-variable receiver: just continue traversing inside it
traverse(recv)
case v: Variable =>
directVars += v
case Operator(es, _) =>
es.foreach(traverse)
}
}
lambdaVarUsageCollector.traverse(body)
val safeVars = allVarsInBody.filter { v =>
isMutableType(v.tpe) && !directVars(v) && !badSelectorVars(v)
}

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Comment on lines +884 to +895
// Disallow capturing of variables of mutable type, but allow capturing
// of mutable objects when they are only accessed through immutable (val)
// fields whose types are also immutable (e.g., accessing a val BigInt field
// of a mutable class).
val allVarsInBody = exprOps.variablesOf(body)
val safeVars = allVarsInBody.filter(v => isMutableType(v.tpe) && isAccessedOnlyThroughImmutableFields(v, body))
val captured = (allVarsInBody -- safeVars).flatMap { v =>
env.targets.get(v.toVal) match {
case Some(targets) => targets.map(_.receiver)
case None => Set(v)
}
}.filter(vd => isMutableType(vd.tpe)) -- aliasedParams.map(_.toVariable).toSet
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A regression test would help ensure this relaxation doesn’t accidentally allow captures of reassignable variables (var a: A) where the body reads a.v. Adding an extraction/invalid benchmark for that pattern (or extending an existing one) would guard the intended behavior while still allowing the this.v scenario.

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Capture of this.v is too restrictive when v is a field of a mutable class this

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