From: Mike Dvorkin <mike@...>
Date: 2006-09-20T14:05:00+09:00
Subject: Re: => A newb question

It's a little known fact, but just like Perl (but unlike PHP!) you  
can use commas instead of =>, for example:

$ irb
 >> a = { 10, 'litte', :monkeys, 'jumping', 'on a bed' }
SyntaxError: compile error
(irb):1: odd number list for Hash
         from (irb):1
 >> a = { 10, 'litte', :monkeys, 'jumping', 'on', 'a bed' }
=> {"on"=>"a bed", :monkeys=>"jumping", 10=>"litte"}

And since it's a hash the order is not guaranteed (again, just like  
Perl, but unlike PHP).

Mike Dvorkin
http://www.rubywizards.com


On Sep 19, 2006, at 8:18 PM, Devin Mullins wrote:

> Dominic Son wrote:
>> Thanks for the clarification. I feel like an enlightened newbie  
>> right now.
> Keep in mind that you *can* use the = sign inside a Hash literal,  
> which is why it's not available for use by the Hash syntax:
>   hash = { :key => :value, :blah => foo = 5 }
>   p hash, foo
> Not that that's not a really screwy thing to do...
>
> Devin
>