From: Matthew Smillie <M.B.Smillie@...>
Date: 2006-06-12T03:45:55+09:00
Subject: Re: gets problem - strange

On Jun 11, 2006, at 19:21, Jim Freeze wrote:

> This is a problem that was pointed out by Esteban Velazquez.
>
>   % cat gets2.rb
>   #!/usr/bin/ruby
>
>   print "getting "; puts gets
>
> Sending the app arguments returns an error:
>
>   % ruby gets2.rb fred
>   gets2.rb:3:in `gets': No such file or directory - fred  
> (Errno::ENOENT)
>           from gets2.rb:3
>
> But, with no arguments, it runs ok.

Check the documentation for the method:
http://ruby-doc.org/core/classes/Kernel.html#M002976

"Returns (and assigns to $_) the next line from the list of files in  
ARGV (or $*), or from standard input if no files are present on the  
command line."

You can explicitly use $stdin.gets or STDIN.gets to get the behaviour  
you want.

matthew smillie.