From: George Ogata <george.ogata@...>
Date: 2007-01-23T10:58:06+09:00
Subject: Re: Placing tabs in strings in irb

On 1/23/07, Michael W. Ryder <_mwryder@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
> Is there any reason I cannot embed tabs in a string while using irb?  I
> am trying to create a string using tabs to separate the various values
> for testing -- i.e. a = '1      2       3       4'.  Using irb it either  ignores the tab
> character or places a random value in the string.
> On a related note why is the value for the above string '1' if I use
> a.to_i to display it?  I would have expected an error.

I'm guessing this behavior is due to readline, which is normally
compiled into into irb if available.  If so, you can also insert tabs
using M-TAB (a.k.a. alt-tab).  Try "info readline" for more info (or
google "info readline" if you don't have it available).