From: Conrad Schneiker <schneik@...>
Date: 2001-03-07T16:07:05+09:00
Subject: [ruby-talk:12213] Re: FEATURE REQUEST: 'my' local variables

Guy Decoux wrote:

# >>>>> "L" == Leo Razoumov <see_signature@127.0.0.1> writes:
# 
# L> {
# L>   my x = 7  # new varible 'x' shadowing 'x' from line_1 
#      ^^
#      ||
# 
#  Please, no. Why make the same error of perl with this very strange
#  name ?

And why make the same error as Perl by distinguishing the shadow case
versus the non-shadow case? (Or so it seems to me, because
I was always writing my, my, my all the time in Perl.)

So why not this half-baked partly off-the-wall idea:

  [...]
  { 
    x = 7       # New variable 'x' shadowing previous 'x'.
    prior x = 8 # Changing previously existing variable 'x'.
  [...]

Maybe 
   'ext' -- for external to local scope 
   'prev' -- for previous scope
   'enc' -- for enclosing scope
   'outer' -- for outer scope
would be better than 'prior'.

Conrad Schneiker
(This note is unofficial and subject to improvement without notice.)