BWAPI idiomatic Rust binding variant 2 from Migi

playground.rs

use std::marker::PhantomData;
use std::cell::Cell;

pub struct Game<'g> {
    // Putting the lifetime 'g into a PhantomData<Cell<&'g ()>> instead of a
    // PhantomData<&'g ()> makes 'g invariant instead of covariant.
    // I don't know if that's necessary here, but better be safe than sorry.
    // See https://doc.rust-lang.org/nomicon/subtyping.html for more info.
    phantom: PhantomData<Cell<&'g ()>>,
}

pub struct Unit<'g> {
    phantom: PhantomData<Cell<&'g ()>>,
}

impl<'g> Game<'g> {
    pub fn some_fn_that_returns_a_unit(&mut self) -> Unit<'g> {
        Unit { phantom: PhantomData }
    }
}

// The crux of this "solution" is this function.
// It takes a closure that gets called every time a new game starts.
// This closure takes the game as an argument, and this game has a certain lifetime 'g associated with it,
// and everything you want to do with the game (accessing units etc.) must use that lifetime 'g.
// 
// The lifetime that 'g will actually be is 'static, but the closure doesn't know that.
// It must work with all possible lifetimes 'g. Furthermore, it can't know that when the closure
// gets called again later (when a second game starts), that the lifetime is the same,
// so it should be impossible to "store" a unit and use it in a different game.
//
// This closure gets leaked actually, but there should only be one so it's mostly ok.
// This can be fixed in nightly by using Box instead of *mut, but in current stable,
// you can't have statics with destructors.
pub fn init_bwapi<F:'static + for<'g> FnMut(&mut Game<'g>) -> Box<EventHandler<'g> + 'g>>(f:F) {
    unsafe {
        assert!(on_start_handler_ptr.is_none(), "init_bwapi can only be called once");
        on_start_handler_ptr = Some(Box::into_raw(Box::new(f)));
    }
}

pub trait EventHandler<'g> {
    fn on_end(&mut self, game: &mut Game<'g>);
    fn on_frame(&mut self, game: &mut Game<'g>);
    fn on_unit_create(&mut self, game: &mut Game<'g>, unit: Unit<'g>);
    // etc
}

#[allow(non_upper_case_globals)]
static mut on_start_handler_ptr : Option<*mut FnMut(&mut Game<'static>) -> Box<EventHandler<'static>>> = None;
#[allow(non_upper_case_globals)]
static mut game_ptr : Option<*mut Game> = None;
#[allow(non_upper_case_globals)]
static mut event_handler_ptr : Option<*mut EventHandler> = None;

// The fact that these pointers above are wrapped in Options is only because
// I don't know how to initialize them otherwise.
// This can be solved with the lazy_static crate I think, but you can't use crates here
// on the playground.

fn _dll_callback_on_start() {
    unsafe {
        game_ptr = Some(Box::into_raw(Box::new(Game { phantom: PhantomData })));
        let game = &mut *game_ptr.unwrap();
        let on_start = &mut *on_start_handler_ptr.unwrap();
        event_handler_ptr = Some(Box::into_raw(on_start(game)));
    }
}

fn _dll_callback_on_end() {
    unsafe {
        {
            let game = &mut *game_ptr.unwrap();
            let event_handler = &mut *event_handler_ptr.unwrap();
            event_handler.on_end(game);
        }
        
        // delete game and event_handler
        Box::from_raw(game_ptr.unwrap());
        Box::from_raw(event_handler_ptr.unwrap());
    }
}

fn _dll_callback_on_frame() {
    unsafe {
        let game = &mut *game_ptr.unwrap();
        let event_handler = &mut *event_handler_ptr.unwrap();
        event_handler.on_frame(game);
    }
}

fn _dll_callback_on_unit_create() {
    unsafe {
        let game = &mut *game_ptr.unwrap();
        let event_handler = &mut *event_handler_ptr.unwrap();
        let unit = game.some_fn_that_returns_a_unit();
        event_handler.on_unit_create(game, unit);
    }
}

////////// USER CODE /////////////

struct MyEventHandler<'g> {
    last_unit: Option<Unit<'g>>
}

impl<'g> EventHandler<'g> for MyEventHandler<'g> {
    fn on_end(&mut self, _game: &mut Game<'g>) {
        println!("game ended");
    }
    fn on_frame(&mut self, _game: &mut Game<'g>) {
        println!("New frame. Unit exists? {}", self.last_unit.is_some());
    }
    fn on_unit_create(&mut self, _game: &mut Game<'g>, unit: Unit<'g>) {
        println!("unit created");
        self.last_unit = Some(unit);
    }
}

fn main() {
    init_bwapi(|_game| {
        println!("new game");
        Box::new(MyEventHandler {
            last_unit: None
        })
    });

    _dll_callback_on_start();
    _dll_callback_on_frame();
    _dll_callback_on_unit_create();
    _dll_callback_on_frame();
    _dll_callback_on_frame();
    _dll_callback_on_end();
    _dll_callback_on_start();
    _dll_callback_on_frame();
    _dll_callback_on_frame();
    _dll_callback_on_end();
}