Background
==========
Slices currently have an unstable [`rotate`] method which rotates
elements in the slice to the _left_ N positions. [Here][tracking] is the
tracking issue for this unstable feature.
```rust
let mut a = ['a', 'b' ,'c', 'd', 'e', 'f'];
a.rotate(2);
assert_eq!(a, ['c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'a', 'b']);
```
Proposal
========
Deprecate the [`rotate`] method and introduce `rotate_left` and
`rotate_right` methods.
```rust
let mut a = ['a', 'b' ,'c', 'd', 'e', 'f'];
a.rotate_left(2);
assert_eq!(a, ['c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'a', 'b']);
```
```rust
let mut a = ['a', 'b' ,'c', 'd', 'e', 'f'];
a.rotate_right(2);
assert_eq!(a, ['e', 'f', 'a', 'b', 'c', 'd']);
```
Justification
=============
I used this method today for my first time and (probably because I’m a
naive westerner who reads LTR) was surprised when the docs mentioned that
elements get rotated in a left-ward direction. I was in a situation
where I needed to shift elements in a right-ward direction and had to
context switch from the main problem I was working on and think how much
to rotate left in order to accomplish the right-ward rotation I needed.
Ruby’s `Array.rotate` shifts left-ward, Python’s `deque.rotate` shifts
right-ward. Both of their implementations allow passing negative numbers
to shift in the opposite direction respectively.
Introducing `rotate_left` and `rotate_right` would:
- remove ambiguity about direction (alleviating need to read docs 😉)
- make it easier for people who need to rotate right
[`rotate`]: https://doc.rust-lang.org/std/primitive.slice.html#method.rotate
[tracking]: https://github.com/rust-lang/rust/issues/41891
Many AsciiExt imports have become useless thanks to the inherent ascii
methods added in the last commits. These were removed. In some places, I
fully specified the ascii method being called to enforce usage of the
AsciiExt trait. Note that some imports are not removed but tagged with
a `#[cfg(stage0)]` attribute. This is necessary, because certain ascii
methods are not yet available in stage0. All those imports will be
removed later.
Additionally, failing tests were fixed. The test suite should exit
successfully now.
