Array.to_hash

Hi guys,

I have come across this a couple of times now and was wondering if there is
an easy way to accomplish what I am trying to do. I have an Nx2 array, where
the first and last items can themselves be arrays (or anything, really), and
would like to create a hash out of it where n[0] => n[1] for all n in N. The
solution I usually use is something to the effect of:

h = {}
N.each { h[N.first] = N.last }

I find it a bit annoying that this has to take two lines though, especially
since this means I can't easily make h a constant, for instance. The best
method I have found so far to do this in one line is something to the effect
of:

Hash[*N]

but this destroys the requirement of N's being more complicated than single,
simple items, and is not, in my opinion, particularly readable/pretty.

My suggestion, if no other nice/easy alternative exists, is a method like:

N.to_hash

This method would throw an error if the array is not Nx2, otherwise would
return the hash I have just mentioned. This should be an easy to write, and
I'd be happy to do it. In fact if I can remember which project it was and
find it in my files, I should already have this written.

Forgive me, but I'm new to this ruby-core list (first post! :)), so I am not
intimately familiar yet with the ticketing, requests, patches, etc process
you use.

Thanks,

- Nitay.