From: Robert Klemme <bob.news@...>
Date: 2005-05-09T06:39:34+09:00
Subject: Re: Query about the top level object


"Gavri Fernandez" <gavri.fernandez@gmail.com> schrieb im Newsbeitrag 
news:e3ecfac70505081403528b2725@mail.gmail.com...
> Hi everyone,
>
> From the pickaxe first edition:
>  "At the top level, we're executing code in the context of some
> predefined object. When we define methods, we're actually creating
> (private) singleton methods for this object."
>
> Is this true? It is true that methods defined at the top-level are
> defined as singleton methods of "main" - the top level object? I
> thought that the methods added at the top-level are defined as private
> methods of Object. (Where I learnt this from, I'm not sure).
> Experimenting gave me the latter result.
>
>>def whoa
>>  puts "in whoa"
>>end
>>puts Object.new.private_methods.find {|x| x == "whoa"}
>
> prints "whoa\n" to the screen.
>
> So is the pickaxe wrong? Or am I missing something big?

This is interesting:

$ ruby -e 'def xxxx() end; [Object.instance_methods, private_methods, 
Object.new.methods, Object.new.private_methods].each {|m| 
p(m.grep(/xxxx/))}'
[]
["xxxx"]
[]
["xxxx"]
$ ruby -v
ruby 1.8.2 (2004-12-25) [i386-cygwin]

I guess it has something to do with the implementation of 
#private_methods...

Kind regards

    robert