From: ara.t.howard@...
Date: 2006-05-16T23:17:55+09:00
Subject: Re: Forcing some code to run at the end of tests

On Tue, 16 May 2006, Vidar Larsen wrote:

> It looks like the ordering is important. If you do:
>
> require 'test/unit'
> BEGIN{ puts '======== BEGIN ========' }
> END{ puts '======== END ========' }
>
> class ATest < Test::Unit::TestCase
>  def test_a() assert true end
> end
>
> then the result will be:
>
> ======== BEGIN ========
> ======== END ========
> Loaded suite a
> Started
> .
> Finished in 0.001859 seconds.
>
> 1 tests, 1 assertions, 0 failures, 0 errors
>
> The problem is that include/import on top is idiomatic (even sometimes
> necessary) in for instance C/C++ and Java, so it seems natural to carry that
> over to Ruby.

it's also idiomatic to have BEGIN/END blocks before require though, because
BEGIN actually happens before any requires take place and END needs to occur
(typically) even if require throws an exception.

     harp:~ > cat a.rb
     BEGIN{ p Queue rescue warn $! }

     END{ p Queue }

     require 'thread'
     raise



     harp:~ > ruby a.rb
     uninitialized constant Queue
     a.rb:4: unhandled exception
     Queue

if you move the BEGIN/END blocks to the end of this script you will only get

     uninitialized constant Queue
     a.rb:4: unhandled exception

which is very counter-intuitive.  in any case it's good pratice to put
BEGIN/END blocks up front imho.

cheers.


-a
-- 
be kind whenever possible... it is always possible.
- h.h. the 14th dali lama