From: dblack@...
Date: 2007-02-19T22:43:07+09:00
Subject: Re: return statement

Hi --

On Mon, 19 Feb 2007, David Vallner wrote:

> Making a wild guess at the signal in the noise.
>
> On Mon, 19 Feb 2007 13:44:46 +0100, Derek Teixeira <derek.teixeira@gmail.com> 
> wrote:
>> Along with that confusion on the return function.. i was code tracing
>> the code below and i understand it, except for one part, i just don't
>> see where the code tells the program to print out the numString. I see
>> it telling the program to in the 'one hundred' section, but not at all
>> in the teens or single digits?
>> 
>> [snip self-depreciation - just keep that one out next time ;P]
>> 
>> def englishNumber number
>>  ## [snip unrelated code]
>>
>>  #  If we got this far, then we had a number somewhere
>>  #  in between 0 and 100, so we need to return "numString".
>>  numString ## equivalent to "return numString"
>> end
>> 
>
> In Ruby, a function always returns the value of the last expression in its 
> definition by default if it reaches the end.
>
> (I really, really, really hate on relying on this behaviour because it makes 
> it easy to miss the fact that this is happening instead of just a "void" 
> method call, or to miss that the method is in fact returning anything at all, 
> and it really doesn't belong in a beginners' book. Tut. Oversight maybe?)

No; Chris knows what he's doing.  It's pretty fundamental -- I always
make a point of explaining it when I introduce the topic of methods to
beginners.  Otherwise simple things like:

   def of_age?
     age > 17
   end

make no sense.  It's basically just a function that performs a
calculation.


David

-- 
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