Extending empty tuple in generic functions causes compiler to infer arrays as tuples

[ipotuzhnov]

TypeScript Version: 3.4.5

Search Terms:
empty tuple, type inference, generic function

Code
Basically I'm writing a generic function with dynamic type mapping. I think this use case is pretty common for database drivers and JSON validators and I found some related issues. There is a workaround and I want to confirm whether it is intended behavior or a bug.

interface TypeMap { STRING: string; NUMBER: number;}
type MapTypes<T> = {
 [P in keyof T]: T[P] extends keyof TypeMap ? TypeMap[T[P]] : never
};

declare function fromArray<T extends ReadonlyArray<keyof TypeMap>>(
 types: T, params: MapTypes<T>): void;

fromArray(['STRING', 'NUMBER', 'STRING'], ['abc', 123, 'xyz']); // ok
// the default behavior is to infer types in array as type union
fromArray(['STRING', 'NUMBER', 'STRING'], ['abc', '123', 'xyz']); // no error
fromArray(['STRING', 'NUMBER', 'STRING'] as const, ['abc', '123', 'xyz']); // error

declare function fromTuple<T extends([] | ReadonlyArray<keyof TypeMap>)>(
 types: T, params: MapTypes<T>): void;

fromTuple(['STRING', 'NUMBER', 'STRING'], ['abc', 123, 'xyz']); // ok
// T extends([]|MyType) cases the compiler to infer array as tuple
fromTuple(['STRING', 'NUMBER', 'STRING'], ['abc', '123', 'xyz']); // error
fromTuple(['STRING', 'NUMBER', 'STRING'] as const, ['abc', '123', 'xyz']); // error

Expected behavior:
Type of the array literal is inferred as array of union type.

Actual behavior:
Type of the array literal is inferred as tuple when T extends []|MyType is used in generic function.
I'd prefer it to be the expected behavior, but I didn't find any tests for that use case.

Playground Link:
You can see the same behavior in the playground

Related Issues:
#13151
#22679

Related PR
This PR includes a similar test, but it there is no test for empty tuple and array combination #26676

[ahejlsberg]

This is working as intended. We only infer tuple types when the contextual type is or contains a tuple-like type.

[ipotuzhnov]

Anders Hejlsberg (@ahejlsberg) Great, thank you for confirming.

Can I add some tests for this behavior then? I wasn't able to find anything similar by grepping tests directory (grep 'extends \[\]' -r tests/).
There are tests that check a combination of two tuples, but not a combination of a tuple and array.

[ahejlsberg]

Yes, it is the intended behavior. See #27179 (comment) for the recommended pattern.

[ipotuzhnov]

Thank you for the link. I think I've seen that issue, but didn't go through all comments.