From: ara.t.howard@...
Date: 2006-08-02T05:28:40+09:00
Subject: Re: I thought this was the one that worked?

On Wed, 2 Aug 2006, Chad Perrin wrote:

> On Wed, Aug 02, 2006 at 05:12:02AM +0900, ara.t.howard@noaa.gov wrote:
>> On Wed, 2 Aug 2006, Chad Perrin wrote:
>>>
>>> Wait . . . are you serious?  Ruby is using dynamic scope here?  Ugh.
>>
>> no.
>>
>>   def x
>>     puts a
>>   end
>>
>> is __lexical__ scoping.  not dynamic.
>
> It's not lexical scoping if that "a" variable is separate from the "a"
> variable in the enclosing scope.

yes.  it is, because there is no 'a' in the enclosing dynamic scope:

     harp:~ > cat a.rb
     a = 42

     def m() p a end

     m

     harp:~ > ruby a.rb
     a.rb:4:in `m': undefined local variable or method `a' for main:Object (NameError)
             from a.rb:6


you have to understand that ruby doesn't always use one method of scoping -
sometimes it's dynamic and sometimes it's lexical.

-a
-- 
we can never obtain peace in the outer world until we make peace with
ourselves.
- h.h. the 14th dali lama