io: clarify Copy docs regarding error handling

"returns ... the first error" was misleading or at least confusing:
in case a Read results in an error with non-zero bytes read, and the
subsequent Write also results in an error, the error from Write is
returned, which is the second one (in the temporal dimension).

Fixes #9744

Change-Id: If8925a701e4fae820cd9df7446503403fc0785d4
Reviewed-on: https://go-review.googlesource.com/3686
Reviewed-by: Brad Fitzpatrick <bradfitz@golang.org>

2 files changed, 31 insertions, 2 deletions

diff --git a/src/io/io.go b/src/io/io.go
index 7507a84929..12833ef214 100644
--- a/src/io/io.go
+++ b/src/io/io.go
@@ -336,8 +336,9 @@ func CopyN(dst Writer, src Reader, n int64) (written int64, err error) {
 }
 
 // Copy copies from src to dst until either EOF is reached
-// on src or an error occurs.  It returns the number of bytes
-// copied and the first error encountered while copying, if any.
+// on src or an error occurs. It returns the number of bytes
+// copied and the error that prevented it from progressing
+// further, if any.
 //
 // A successful Copy returns err == nil, not err == EOF.
 // Because Copy is defined to read from src until EOF, it does
diff --git a/src/io/io_test.go b/src/io/io_test.go
index 57db1fbf0b..d2f725a94d 100644
--- a/src/io/io_test.go
+++ b/src/io/io_test.go
@@ -78,6 +78,34 @@ func TestCopyPriority(t *testing.T) {
 	}
 }
 
+type zeroErrReader struct {
+	err error
+}
+
+func (r zeroErrReader) Read(p []byte) (int, error) {
+	return copy(p, []byte{0}), r.err
+}
+
+type errWriter struct {
+	err error
+}
+
+func (w errWriter) Write([]byte) (int, error) {
+	return 0, w.err
+}
+
+// In case a Read results in an error with non-zero bytes read, and
+// the subsequent Write also results in an error, the error from Write
+// is returned, as it is the one that prevented progressing further.
+func TestCopyReadErrWriteErr(t *testing.T) {
+	er, ew := errors.New("readError"), errors.New("writeError")
+	r, w := zeroErrReader{err: er}, errWriter{err: ew}
+	n, err := Copy(w, r)
+	if n != 0 || err != ew {
+		t.Errorf("Copy(zeroErrReader, errWriter) = %d, %v; want 0, writeError", n, err)
+	}
+}
+
 func TestCopyN(t *testing.T) {
 	rb := new(Buffer)
 	wb := new(Buffer)