From: Robert Dober <robert.dober@...>
Date: 2006-10-08T21:10:47+09:00
Subject: Re: nil being empty

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On 10/8/06, Marc Heiler <shevegen@linuxmail.org> wrote:
>
> "[...] neither Ola Bini nor Martin Fowler consider it necessarily bad
> form, depending on your context, i.e. whether it adds to or detracts
> from the maintainability of your code."
>
> Surprisingly, with few exceptions, I found that in Ruby its
> usually better to go very straight at a problem, and better short
> than long... helped me to maintain my own code nicely.
>
> That also means, for me though, that I do agree it is a bit awkward
> to ask whether the spoon is full or empty, when there really is
> no spoon. :-)
>
> "Then by simple logic, the right solution will be to have it
> return false"
>
> I dont think you can apply a lot of logic
> on nil at all. Maybe not even a simple logic. ;-)


Hmm Tom and you  have brought up the *real* question, who really is this ni=
l
buddy?
Modelling it correctly seems almost impossible, maybe you might want to not=
e
my "Void" proposals above ( I actually like that pun ;).
But I was quite convinced that from a less philosophical point of view,
defining NilClass#empty? should ring alarm bells in your head about the
design, which does not mean it is bad, you know once I calculated the first
digit of Pi, still no one calculated the last, although I have asked
*politely* ;)
and it turned out to be 2, so that was not a proof that my calculation was
bad, but I checked them out nevertheless, and of course it was correct
anyway.
Hopefully that extreme example takes my point across, it would be most
interesting to have a look at the code where your NilClass#empty? was
necessary.

Cheers
Robert

--
> Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.
>
>


--=20
Deux choses sont infinies : l'univers et la b=EAtise humaine ; en ce qui
concerne l'univers, je n'en ai pas acquis la certitude absolue.

- Albert Einstein

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