From: matz@... (Yukihiro Matsumoto)
Date: 2001-03-14T13:26:18+09:00
Subject: [ruby-talk:12599] Re: FEATURE REQUEST: 'my' local variables

Hi,

In message "[ruby-talk:12570] Re: FEATURE REQUEST: 'my' local variables"
    on 01/03/14, Dave Thomas <Dave@PragmaticProgrammer.com> writes:

|Hi matz:
|
|Just to break the chain of the thread a bit, can I ask two questions:
|
|1. If you were designing Ruby over again, what would do with the
|   scoping of variables in blocks?

I wouldn't enable block local variable, at least by default.  It's for
making closure/proc object usable (imagine closure without local
variables), but I now think I should have made it optional.

Implicit scope propagation, declarative assignment, and bracketed
block parameters are trials (works mostly in combination of all) to
fix this single problem.

|2. Is there really a big enough problem with what we have now to merit
|   changing things?

I believe so.  Many, including even me, are struck by the bugs like

  loop do
    id = 25
    break
  end
  p id

But I'm still wondering if those three BIG changes are affordable. 

							matz.