Forc ABI generation doesn't fail for scripts

[adlerjohn]

Forc version: v0.1.6

Running forc json-abi for a script project gives the following output instead of an error:

$ forc json-abi
  Compiled library "core".
  Compiled library "core".
  Compiled library "lib-std".
  Compiled script "foo".
[]

Only contracts have an ABI, so forc json-abi should fail with an explanative error otherwise.

[adlerjohn]

For posterity, libraries could have their ABI dumped with a flag, but by default settings to prevent user error the compiler should error if a non-contract tries to dump ABI.

[eureka-cpu]

@adlerjohn can you think of any other instance where the json-abi output would be empty?

[adlerjohn]

Empty, or error?

[eureka-cpu]

Empty, or error?

Maybe I'm misinterpreting, it is giving an empty json abi output, right? This is should give an error message: Cannot generate JSON ABI for non-contracts. But if there are any other reasons the command would produce an empty output, would we want it to catch that as an error too, or just leave as is?

[eureka-cpu]

Essentially, I'm asking if we actually need to check if it's a script, or if we can assume based on the empty output that it's a non-contract?

[adlerjohn]

You have to check that it's a script or a predicate. It may be the case that a contract with no ABI produces an empty ABI file. That could happen if the contract is meant to be an upgradable implementation for example.