[ruby-core:47315] [ruby-trunk - Feature #4801] Shorthand Hash Syntax for Strings

Issue #4801 has been updated by alexch (Alex Chaffee).


nobu, your statement is true, and if symbols are *implemented* as strings then it will still be true. I promise! We can have "class Symbol < String" and they will still be unique objects with fixed names.

Implementing symbols as frozen strings works for Smalltalk, so why couldn't it work for Ruby? From the Smalltalk documentation, "Symbols are Strings that are represented uniquely." That doesn't sound very controversial, does it?

Matz argued the case here -- http://blade.nagaokaut.ac.jp/cgi-bin/scat.rb/ruby/ruby-core/9192 -- and what he calls a "side effect" is actually solving a major problem with the language. It is very surprising to newcomers (and annoying to experts) that string keys in a hash do not match symbol keys, and that JSON and XML import/export don't work right for symbols, and that some libraries expect strings while others expect symbols, and that basically Ruby makes you think really hard about whether this *particular* series of characters is and/or should be a symbol or a string.

I make this case, and refute some objections, in this StackOverflow question: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/11085564/why-are-symbols-not-frozen-strings

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Feature #4801: Shorthand Hash Syntax for Strings
https://bugs.ruby-lang.org/issues/4801#change-29052

Author: wardrop (Tom Wardrop)
Status: Assigned
Priority: Normal
Assignee: nobu (Nobuyoshi Nakada)
Category: 
Target version: 


Assuming there's no technical limitation or ambiguities, I suggest that the shorthand syntax for symbol's in the context of an array, be applied to strings also.

E.g. {'key': 'value'}

I don't believe there are any syntax ambiguous that this would give rise to. The only consideration that may need to be made, is if there are plans to support shorthand syntax for quoted symbols, e.g. {'key': 'value'}. If quoted symbols are off the table, then there's no harm in implementing a shorthand hash syntax for strings. This may stem the growing problem of what I like to call 'symbolitis' , where symbol's are selected as the key type purely for their aesthetics and ease of use, even when strings are a more appropriate choice.

Thoughts?


-- 
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