Why can't `Self` be used to refer to an enum's variant in a method body?

Question

This question is now obsolete because this feature has been implemented. Related answer.

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The following Rust code fails to compile:

enum Foo {
          


        

Answer 1

Enum constructors != associated items.

It is a known issue, but it's not expected to be fixed, at least not in the foreseeable future. From what I have gathered it is not trivial to just allow this to work; at this point it is more likely that the related documentation or the error message will be improved.

There is little documentation I could find on the topic of associated items in general; The Rust Book has a chapter on associated types, though. In addition, there are plenty of good answers about Self in this related question.