[ruby-talk:01770] $stdin and DATA

Was was trying to test a program that would normally read using
Kernel#gets. Because I wanted the test to be self contained, I thought 
I'd include the test data in the file:

   while DATA.gets
     # ...
   end
   __END__
   stuff...

This worked fine. However, to make the changeover between test and
production easier, I thought I'd be clever:

   $stdin = DATA
   while gets
     # ...
   end
   __END__
   stuff...

But this doesn't seem to work. Then, while playing with this, I
discovered something equally strange:

   $stdin = DATA
   while DATA.gets
     # ...
   end
   __END__
   stuff...

Simply assigning DATA to $stdin stops the loop from working.


Is there a way to do what I need - to have a plain 'gets' read from
DATA? And is the above behavior expected?

Regards


Dave