From: Jacob Fugal <lukfugl@...>
Date: 2006-08-02T05:43:30+09:00
Subject: Re: I thought this was the one that worked?

On 8/1/06, Chad Perrin <perrin@apotheon.com> wrote:
> On Wed, Aug 02, 2006 at 05:19:38AM +0900, Jacob Fugal wrote:
> > Actually, if you go back and read David's post [ruby-talk:205331],
> > which is the first reference to hair splitting in this thread, you'll
> > see that he clearly believes both of the first two examples to be
> > closures. When he mentions hair splitting, it's directly in relation
> > to the third form -- an unconverted (yielded to) block.
>
> You were right, up to the point where you said "When he mentions hair
> splitting".  The problem at that point that prompted him to mention hair
> splitting was the fact that I was balking at defining that second
> example as a "closure".  I've now come to the conclusion that the second
> example is a closure according to at least some, valid from a given
> perspective, interpretations of the meaning of "closure".  Thus, I quit
> splitting that hair and said "Okay, so I'll stipulate that the second
> example can be called a closure, depending on interpretation."

Ok, I've tried my bit at patience. I am certain now that you are being
intentionally stubborn and difficult.

Let me quote from the message I referenced.

You said, "I don't see how it's still a closure if the 'bar = 1' is
removed from foo."

He replied, "It's a closure because it carries the context of its
creation with it."

He certainly didn't hair-split around that.

He then proceeded to the "hair-splitting section":

> Some subtle but possible interesting hair-splitting:
>
> Of course, not all blocks end up getting turned into Proc objects;
> some remain just syntactic constructs:
>
>   a = 1
>   [1,2,3].each {|x| puts x + a }
>
> I guess you could debate whether that block is a closure, since it
> never leaves the context where it's created

I can't see how you can interpret his "hair-splitting" as not
referring to his reference to non-converted blocks.

Jacob Fugal