From: Kalman Noel <invalid@...>
Date: 2006-09-17T23:26:06+09:00
Subject: Re: irb question

Rand Waltzman:
> def hello
> 	puts "hello there"
> end
> [...]
> Another interesting phenomenon occurs if I type "hello = 42" to the 
> interpreter, i.e., I try to rebind hello.  That seems to work fine as 
> well.  If I type hello, I get 42 as expected.  However, if I try to 
> reenter the definition of hello as I had it in the original file and try 
> typing hello again, I still get 42.  The question is, why didn't it 
> allow me to rebind hello?

In Ruby, methods and local variables live in different parts of the world.
The current object can have a method with the same name as a local
variable. In such cases, the interpreter supposes that the programmer
forgot about the method and wants the variable.

Kalman