[ruby-core:79616] Re: Immutable Strings vs Symbols

On 02/19 11:08, Daniel Ferreira wrote:
> There are challenges but maybe we can find a solution that would be
> feasible in Ruby 3.
> 
> I would like to start a new discussion about this subject because I
> deeply believe ruby will be better if we succeed to do so.
> 
> As I see it, everyone agrees there is a problem.
> We just weren't able to find the best solution to resolve it.
> Lets try to do that in Ruby 3.

Not everyone agrees there is a problem.  I think the current behavior
of treating strings and symbols differently is best, as they represent
separate concepts.

My comment on #7792:

"The basic philosophical difference between a symbol and a string is a
ruby symbol is an identifier, while a ruby string just represents
arbitrary data. You should convert a string to a symbol if you know that
the data the string contains represents an identifier you would like to
use. You should convert a symbol to a string if you are using name of
the identifier as data."

Matz's final comment on #5964:

"In Ruby, Symbols annd Strings are different in both semantics and
behavior (and implementation).  Unifying them cause a lot of problems.
I guess it's not worth changing."

I think part of the confusion about the difference between Symbol and
String stems from the changes in ruby 1.9, which added many String
methods to Symbol.  In ruby 1.8, this distinction of symbols for
identifiers and strings for data was more apparent.

Thanks,
Jeremy

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