From: Jim Weirich <jim@...>
Date: 2004-11-29T14:10:23+09:00
Subject: Re: Seeking advice on some method names

> On Mon, 29 Nov 2004, Sam Stephenson wrote:
> > Why not String?
> >   "Test::Unit".to_class  # => Test::Unit

On Sunday 28 November 2004 11:34 pm, David A. Black wrote:
> I'm not sure what either of these adds to const_get -- or, to put it
> another way, why there should be a special method to do (essentially)
> a const_get only for strings that represent class names.

Why?  Because it is a common function that is easy to do wrong.  The quick and 
obvious choices (eval(string) and Object.const_get(string)) are flawed. And 
the one-liner that does it correctly ...

   string.split("::").inject(Object) { |ns, n| ns.const_get(n) }

... is hardly transparent.

It is a common enough activity that having a standard and canonical way of 
converting strings to classes would ease a number of tasks (e.g. anytime you 
wish to specify a class in a config file, input stream or data base).

-- 
-- Jim Weirich    jim@weirichhouse.org     http://onestepback.org
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"Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct, 
not tried it." -- Donald Knuth (in a memo to Peter van Emde Boas)