From: Gavin Sinclair <gsinclair@...>
Date: 2004-05-13T15:45:16+09:00
Subject: Re: Proposal: Object#send(nil) -> self

Hal wrote:
>>>Perhaps ... see http://rcrchive.net/rcr/RCR/RCR249
>>
>>
>> Just looked (and voted in favour) assuming that what
>> your requesting is Object#to_self.
>>
>> I just re-read the thread and didn't see that suggested
>> anywhere.
>>
>> If you resubmitted with the more ruby-like name,
>> it might be more obvious that your request is reasonable.
>>
>> Even more strongly, I wonder why it's not in Ruby now.
>
> I'm not entirely sure I see a need for it, but I don't
> object to it.
>
> As for the name, personally I don't see that "self" would
> conflict anywhere. You wouldn't be calling it from within
> the object's methods, and if you did, well... you would
> just get the "self" we have always had.
>
> "self" with a receiver, obj.self, does not currently have
> any meaning I'm aware of.

So, given this:

  class Object
    def self
      self
    end
  end

Would the marked line below be using the method 'self' or the special
variable 'self'?

  class X
    def foo
      self.bar       # This one.
    end
    def bar
      5
    end
  end

Furthermore, is the definition of Object#self above recursive? ;)

Gavin