From: Chris Moline <ugly-daemon@...>
Date: 2001-08-24T14:26:06+09:00
Subject: [ruby-talk:20248] Re: ++ Operator

On Fri, Aug 24, 2001 at 04:46:32AM +0900, Guillaume Cottenceau wrote:
> Maybe I just don't see the future problems, but I think it would not be
> very confusing. It would try to "increment" the object behind the
> variable. It would fail just as it currently fails, on a String:
> 
> irb(main):001:0> a = "foo"
> "foo"
> irb(main):002:0> a += 1
> TypeError: failed to convert Fixnum into String
>         from (irb):2:in `+'
>         from (irb):2
> irb(main):003:0>
> 
> 
> The ++ would also fail.... unless you would imagine it should succeed for
> some reason ? If the "++" is just converted to "+= 1" ok it would fail for
> the same reason, but I imagine you would like that the "++" behaves
> differently among objects because some of them could be "incremented"
> while not "added the Fixnum `1'".
> 
> In my opinion, I would not be shocked if it would simply convert to +=1
> and then fail for relevant reason for most objects.
> 
> The only moment where I miss the "++" is actually when I need to increment
> a Number... Writing "a += 1" is just.. depressing.. ;p.

I agree with you here. I would like to see "++" as an opertor that can be
redefined as appropriate as much as "+" or "<<". Then for strings it might be
string.succ and for fixnums it would be += 1 and an error for where it's
inappropriate. But i don't know how much trouble that would be to implement.

Have you tried making it a behaviour?? I haven't yet but I will soon

Sincerly,
Chris Moline