From: dave.burt@...
Date: 2005-08-31T14:21:34+09:00
Subject: Re: More elegant replacement for global variables

Constants are a kind of global variable. Classes get free constants.
You can use something like the Singeton pattern:

module XmlRpc
  def self.login(user, pass)
    @user = user
    @client = = XMLRPC::Client.new(...)
    @session_id = @client.call("xmlrpc.method", $user, $pass)
  end
  def self.user() @user or raise "Not initialized" end
  def self.client() @user or raise "Not initialized" end
  def self.session_id() @session_id or raise "Not initialized" end
end

Then you can login globally like so:
  XmlRpc.login("me", "my_password")

Then elsewhere you can use:
  client = XmlRpc.client
  session_id = XmlRpc.session_id
(Which will throw an exception if you're not logged in yet)

What do you think? It's still global.

Of course another idea is to use a single global, a Hash or OpenStruct,
for these related data points: $xmlrpc[:session_id]

Cheers,
Dave