From: James Edward Gray II <james@...>
Date: 2005-08-27T03:49:37+09:00
Subject: Re: ruby quiz question '*' on the initialize parameters

On Aug 26, 2005, at 1:39 PM, Gaston Garcia wrote:

> well, now I got lost with that reverse example. but I did get the  
> first one.

It just means that if you have an Array of arguments, you can expand  
it out into the individual members when passing as the final argument  
in a method.  See if this clears it up:

irb(main):001:0> def show( one, two = nil, three = nil )
irb(main):002:1>   puts "one = #{one.inspect}"
irb(main):003:1>   puts "two = #{two.inspect}"
irb(main):004:1>   puts "three = #{three.inspect}"
irb(main):005:1> end
=> nil
irb(main):006:0> arr = [1, 2, 3]
=> [1, 2, 3]
irb(main):007:0> show arr
one = [1, 2, 3]
two = nil
three = nil
=> nil
irb(main):008:0> show *arr
one = 1
two = 2
three = 3
=> nil

In the first call, I pass a single argument (an Array of numbers).   
In the second call, I pass the numbers themselves (three arguments).

Hope that helps.

James Edward Gray II