From: Bill Atkins <batkins57@...>
Date: 2005-04-10T01:29:11+09:00
Subject: Re: Array#last_index

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I don't think this should be all that slow. Ruby tracks the array's length=
=20
as it grows, so all you're doing here is reading a variable from memory and=
=20
subtracting one. Still, it would probably be a good idea to add this to=20
Array.

On Apr 9, 2005 12:49 AM, jzakiya@mail.com <jzakiya@mail.com> wrote:
>=20
> array.last returns the value of the last array element.
>=20
> In many instances it is necessary to get the index value
> of the last array element. This is necessary in many
> sorting and searching algorithms, especially where the
> arrays are dynamically changing in size. You can do it like:
>=20
> class Array
> def last_index; self.length - 1 end
> end
>=20
> But this is slower than necessary, because array.last
> already computes/knows what the last index value is,
> and thus the mechanism already exists to get this info.
>=20
> I would really like to see this method added to class Array.
> It is a nice complement to Array#last, and aides performance.
>=20
> Jabari Zakiya
>=20
>=20


--=20
$stdout.sync =3D true
"Just another Ruby hacker.".each_byte do |b|
('a'..'z').step do|c|print c+"\b";sleep 0.007 end;print b.chr
end; print "\n"

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