What does #[macro_use] mean?

help
1

I have a crate like this:

.
├── Cargo.toml
└── src
    ├── error.rs
    ├── worker.rs
    ├── lib.rs

In error.rs above, I defined a declarative macro foo using macro_rules!. Now I wanted to use macro foo in worker.rs.

After some research, I found that I only need to add the following line at the top of lib.rs:

#[macro_use]

And I did not need to add this to the foo definition itself, nor to worker.rs. But I don't know why.

My question is: what does #[macro_use] mean exactly? especially when it's at the top of lib.rs?

2

It has no meaning "at the top", but more specifically "right before mod error;" has meaning. By default macros are scoped to their module, but #[macro_use] will let it escape to the parent context, including all submodules from there.

See Macros By Example - The Rust Reference

2 Likes
3

By the way, #[macro_use] is now a bit obsolete, since classic pathing can be used with macros provided they get re-exported at their definition site; which has the advantage of being consistent with the rest of the language's items. For more info, see:

https://stackoverflow.com/a/67140319/10776437

1 Like
4

Thanks, this seems to be nicer. When I tried it, the macro works but cargo clippy reports a warning like this:

warning: this import is redundant
  --> src/error.rs:50:1
   |
50 | pub(crate) use foo;
   | ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ help: remove it entirely
   |
   = note: `#[warn(clippy::single_component_path_imports)]` on by default
   = help: for further information visit https://rust-lang.github.io/rust-clippy/master/index.html#single_component_path_imports

This warning seems not valid to me. Is this a clippy bug? or should I fix my code?

5

Well, did you try removing it?

6

It's a clippy false positive, yes, since their maintainers may not be aware of this very pattern.

7

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