Use plain symbols for eieio type descriptors (Bug#29220)

Since Emacs 26, eieio objects use a class record (with circular
references) as the type descriptor of the object record.  This causes
problems when reading back an object from a string, because the class
record is not `eq' to the canonical one (which means that read objects
don't satisfy the foo-p predicate).
* lisp/emacs-lisp/eieio.el (make-instance): As a (partial) fix, set
the record's type descriptor to a plain symbol for the type descriptor
when eieio-backward-compatibility is non-nil (the default).
* lisp/emacs-lisp/eieio-core.el (eieio--object-class): Call
eieio--class-object on the type tag when eieio-backward-compatibility
is non-nil.
(eieio-object-p): Use eieio--object-class instead of
eieio--object-class-tag.
* test/lisp/emacs-lisp/eieio-tests/eieio-test-persist.el
(eieio-test-persist-hash-and-vector)
(eieio-test-persist-interior-lists): Make into functions.
(eieio-persist-hash-and-vector-backward-compatibility)
(eieio-persist-hash-and-vector-no-backward-compatibility)
(eieio-test-persist-interior-lists-backward-compatibility)
(eieio-test-persist-interior-lists-no-backward-compatibility): New
tests which call them, eieio-backward-compatibility let-bound.

2 files changed, 10 insertions, 4 deletions

diff --git a/lisp/emacs-lisp/eieio-core.el b/lisp/emacs-lisp/eieio-core.el
index f879a3999fb..4d55ed6e1d1 100644
--- a/lisp/emacs-lisp/eieio-core.el
+++ b/lisp/emacs-lisp/eieio-core.el
@@ -117,9 +117,6 @@ Currently under control of this var:
 (defsubst eieio--object-class-tag (obj)
   (aref obj 0))
 
-(defsubst eieio--object-class (obj)
-  (eieio--object-class-tag obj))
-
 
 ;;; Important macros used internally in eieio.
 
@@ -132,6 +129,12 @@ Currently under control of this var:
       (or (cl--find-class class) class)
     class))
 
+(defsubst eieio--object-class (obj)
+  (let ((tag (eieio--object-class-tag obj)))
+    (if eieio-backward-compatibility
+        (eieio--class-object tag)
+      tag)))
+
 (defun class-p (x)
   "Return non-nil if X is a valid class vector.
 X can also be is a symbol."
@@ -163,7 +166,7 @@ Return nil if that option doesn't exist."
 (defun eieio-object-p (obj)
   "Return non-nil if OBJ is an EIEIO object."
   (and (recordp obj)
-       (eieio--class-p (eieio--object-class-tag obj))))
+       (eieio--class-p (eieio--object-class obj))))
 
 (define-obsolete-function-alias 'object-p 'eieio-object-p "25.1")
 
diff --git a/lisp/emacs-lisp/eieio.el b/lisp/emacs-lisp/eieio.el
index 38436d1f944..864ac2616b9 100644
--- a/lisp/emacs-lisp/eieio.el
+++ b/lisp/emacs-lisp/eieio.el
@@ -710,6 +710,9 @@ calls `initialize-instance' on that object."
     ;; Call the initialize method on the new object with the slots
     ;; that were passed down to us.
     (initialize-instance new-object slots)
+    (when eieio-backward-compatibility
+      ;; Use symbol as type descriptor, for backwards compatibility.
+      (aset new-object 0 class))
     ;; Return the created object.
     new-object))