docstrings for inner constructors are ignored

[stevengj]

julia> type Foo
       """some docs"""
       Foo() = new()
       end

help?> Foo
search: Foo floor pointer_from_objref OverflowError RoundFromZero FileMonitor

  No documentation found.

  Summary:

  type Foo <: Any

cc @MichaelHatherly

[MichaelHatherly]

Dup of #14962 since the docstring isn't toplevel and so needs to use @doc directly:

julia> type Foo
           @doc """some docs""" ->
           Foo() = new()
       end

help?> Foo
search: Foo floor pointer_from_objref OverflowError RoundFromZero FileMonitor

  some docs

Perhaps we should consider extending where @doc is added automatically since this does come up quite often.

[iagobaapellaniz]

Would be nice to have it automatically on the inner constructors. They are indeed methods on the global scope.

[tkoolen]

It seems the -> is still necessary in order to attach the docstring to an inner constructor. However, that syntax is now deprecated:

┌ Warning: Deprecated syntax `@doc call with ->`.
│ Use `a line break` instead.
└ @ none:24

Could this issue be fixed before removing the deprecated method?

[tpapp]

At the moment, in v1.0

struct Foo
    @doc "best inner constructor ever"
    Foo() = new()
end

works fine.

[cossio]

This is still an issue in Julia v1.7

[LilithHafner]

I believe this is still an issue as of 1.9 and should be fixed. Closing as duplicate of #14962.