From: Trans <transfire@...>
Date: 2005-09-23T12:31:41+09:00
Subject: Re: Inspect, looking in from the outside


Florian Gro� wrote:
> Trans wrote:
>
> > I've been thinking about accessing
> > certain "metainfo" about an object from the outside rather then from
> > the inside to ensure certain results. A friend say it goes against the
> > grain of OOP and polymorphism, but I wonder if certian "metainfo"
> > shouldn't? What do others think?
>
> I dunno, I've been fine with Object.instance_method(:inspect).bind(obj)
> so far -- sure, you can wrap it in a module for convenience, but is it
> really done that frequently?

Ah! You are right. Though writing this out is way too long if you do
use it more then a few times --which I am. Nonetheless I've worked out
another way of dealing with it which wraps it up nicely, so it's no
bother.

 require 'mega/blankslate'

 class Object

  class Inspector < BlankSlate
    def initialize( obj )
      @obj = obj
    end
    def method_missing( sym, *args, &blk )
      Object.instance_method( sym ).bind(@obj).call(*args, &blk )
    end
  end

  def instance
    @_inspector ||= Inspector.new(self)
  end

 end

It would be nice if there could be a module/class method version, as
this still resides in the instance method namespace, but such is not as
strightfoward. Anyway one point of entry in the instance space is
manageable, I guess.

Any additional suggestions? :)

Thanks!
T.