From: stevetuckner <stevetuckner@...>
Date: 2004-09-29T05:29:58+09:00
Subject: DRY ruby idiom

I often use the ||= idiom in ruby for late initialization. But was 
recently looking for an idiom that would allow me to overwrite a 
variable if the right side is defined without repeating myself.

I have used the following:

var = val if val

but I have to repeat val and that violates DRY. I thought maybe &&= 
would work, but did not

var &&= val

That only works if var and val are non-nil. 

Any ideas out there?

Steve Tuckner