RFR: 8349754: Invalid "early reference" error when class extends an outer class [v2]

[Maurizio Cimadamore]

On Thu, 13 Feb 2025 18:38:10 GMT, Maurizio Cimadamore <mcimadamore at openjdk.org> wrote:

>> Thanks, that is a nice simplification.
>> 
>> From what I can tell we still need to make an exception for the `Foo.this.x` case, otherwise this example would fail:
>> 
>> class Early {
>>     int x;
>>     class Sub extends Early {
>>         Sub() {
>>             Early.this.x = 3;
>>             super();
>>         }
>>     }
>> }
>> 
>> Trying to explain this to myself: The current class here is `Foo`, and `Foo.this.x` does indeed refer to a member of class `Foo`.  But it refers to a different _instance_ of class `Foo` from the one under construction.
>> 
>> I suppose this question of "Which _instance_ of class S are we talking about?" only comes up in the compiler in the corner case when a class has S as both a superclass and an outer class, so there's not really "first class" support for answering this question, like there is for answering the question "Is x a member of S?".
>> 
>> Fixed in 589e6d7d2fc.
>
>> From what I can tell we still need to make an exception for the `Foo.this.x`
> 
> Sure - I was referring to the "simple name" part of the affair :-)

> Trying to explain this to myself: The current class here is `Foo`, and `Foo.this.x` does indeed refer to a member of class `Foo`. But it refers to a different _instance_ of class `Foo` from the one under construction.

I will also re-read the JLS carefully, to make sure this is covered

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PR Review Comment: https://git.openjdk.org/jdk/pull/23545#discussion_r1955045911