From: Patrick Gundlach <clr6.10.randomuser@...>
Date: 2005-07-26T03:15:58+09:00
Subject: Re: Newby question 'unless'

Hello David,

> Conditionals give you nil when they're not met, and nil.to_s is an
> empty string, so you don't have to specify a literal empty string in
> cases like this.  

Sure, but not in the case I posted:

>  def to_s
>   "#{@a}" +  (@a == 0 ? "" : "#{@b}" )
>  end


-:4:in `+': cannot convert nil into String (TypeError)
	from -:4:in `to_s'
	from -:8


>     "#{@a}#{@b unless @a.zero?}"

This is indeed much better. Thanks for your advice - I can see my ruby
skills getting better every day.

Patrick