# Objective
- Implements the [Unique Reflect
RFC](https://github.com/nicopap/rfcs/blob/bevy-reflect-api/rfcs/56-better-reflect.md).
## Solution
- Implements the RFC.
- This implementation differs in some ways from the RFC:
- In the RFC, it was suggested `Reflect: Any` but `PartialReflect:
?Any`. During initial implementation I tried this, but we assume the
`PartialReflect: 'static` in a lot of places and the changes required
crept out of the scope of this PR.
- `PartialReflect::try_into_reflect` originally returned `Option<Box<dyn
Reflect>>` but i changed this to `Result<Box<dyn Reflect>, Box<dyn
PartialReflect>>` since the method takes by value and otherwise there
would be no way to recover the type. `as_full` and `as_full_mut` both
still return `Option<&(mut) dyn Reflect>`.
---
## Changelog
- Added `PartialReflect`.
- `Reflect` is now a subtrait of `PartialReflect`.
- Moved most methods on `Reflect` to the new `PartialReflect`.
- Added `PartialReflect::{as_partial_reflect, as_partial_reflect_mut,
into_partial_reflect}`.
- Added `PartialReflect::{try_as_reflect, try_as_reflect_mut,
try_into_reflect}`.
- Added `<dyn PartialReflect>::{try_downcast_ref, try_downcast_mut,
try_downcast, try_take}` supplementing the methods on `dyn Reflect`.
## Migration Guide
- Most instances of `dyn Reflect` should be changed to `dyn
PartialReflect` which is less restrictive, however trait bounds should
generally stay as `T: Reflect`.
- The new `PartialReflect::{as_partial_reflect, as_partial_reflect_mut,
into_partial_reflect, try_as_reflect, try_as_reflect_mut,
try_into_reflect}` methods as well as `Reflect::{as_reflect,
as_reflect_mut, into_reflect}` will need to be implemented for manual
implementors of `Reflect`.
## Future Work
- This PR is designed to be followed up by another "Unique Reflect Phase
2" that addresses the following points:
- Investigate making serialization revolve around `Reflect` instead of
`PartialReflect`.
- [Remove the `try_*` methods on `dyn PartialReflect` since they are
stop
gaps](https://github.com/bevyengine/bevy/pull/7207#discussion_r1083476050).
- Investigate usages like `ReflectComponent`. In the places they
currently use `PartialReflect`, should they be changed to use `Reflect`?
- Merging this opens the door to lots of reflection features we haven't
been able to implement.
- We could re-add [the `Reflectable`
trait](8e3488c880/crates/bevy_reflect/src/reflect.rs (L337-L342))
and make `FromReflect` a requirement to improve [`FromReflect`
ergonomics](https://github.com/bevyengine/rfcs/pull/59). This is
currently not possible because dynamic types cannot sensibly be
`FromReflect`.
- Since this is an alternative to #5772, #5781 would be made cleaner.
---------
Co-authored-by: Alice Cecile <alice.i.cecile@gmail.com>
Co-authored-by: Gino Valente <49806985+MrGVSV@users.noreply.github.com>
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