From: Jan Svitok <jan.svitok@...>
Date: 2006-10-13T06:43:10+09:00
Subject: Re: match with string instead of regexp fails

On 10/12/06, Cameron, Gemma (UK) <Gemma.Cameron@baesystems.com> wrote:
>
> I thought the syntax was incorrect....
>
> "cat" =~ "a" #=> 1
>
> Fails as it's looking to match a reg ex not a string.
>
> Should be:
>
> "cat" =~ /a/ #=> 1
>
> Or am I wrong?!?!

Indeed, the example *is* wrong (judged by current ruby). However the
documentation states that:

str =~ obj => fixnum or nil

Match�<snip> If obj is a String, look for it in str (similar to
String#index). Returns the position the match starts, or nil if there
is no match. Otherwise, invokes obj.=~, passing str as an argument.
The default =~ in Object returns false.

   "cat o' 9 tails" =~ '\d'   #=> nil
<snip>
(http://ruby-doc.org/core/classes/String.html#M001453)

The question was why it doesn't work. The answer: the online
documentation is outdated (I don't know how the docs in the install
package look like, I haven't installed 1.8.5 yet).