From: Jeremy McAnally <jeremymcanally@...>
Date: 2007-03-25T00:12:41+09:00
Subject: Re: Suggestion: swap name of "puts" and "print" and rename "puts" to "put_s"

The puts and putc methods are named after their C-equivalents, so I
see no real benefit in this change.  Someone coming from C or C++
would be more comfortable with the current naming, whereas someone
like yourself (.e.g, coming from BASIC or Python or what have you)
would be more comfortable with your proposed naming.  I think maybe
just keeping it the way it is will satisfy about the same amount of
people and keep all existing code in working order.

You have to learn a lot of new stuff when you learn Ruby, why not a
new output function? ;)

--Jeremy

On 3/24/07, Michael Brooks <michael.brooks@shaw.ca> wrote:
> Hello:
>
> I've been using Ruby on-and-off for about 4 weeks now and love it.
> However, some of the naming consistencies really bug me.  The ones that
> bug me the most are the "print", "puts" and "putc".
>
> I'd like to suggest that the functionality of the names "puts" and
> "print" should be swapped so that "print" automatically sends a newline
> character and "puts" doesn't.  The reasons for this are as follows:
>
> - "print" in other languages I've used (e.g. Basic) sends out a newline
> character.
>
> - "putc" doesn't send out a newline so why should "puts".
>
> - The "puts" method sounds like a techier name so it shouldn't be doing
>   console style formatting and "print" sounds like the name you'd expect
> to be using with terminal / printer based formatted output.
>
> Also, I'd like to suggest that the "putc", "puts", "gets" and "getc",
> etc... should be renamed to "put_c", "put_s", "get_s" and "get_c",
> etc... to keep their syntax consistent with the naming conventions used
> with "to_s", "to_a" and "to_i".  Or alternately, rename "to_s", etc...
> to "tos", etc...  Either way, just make it consistent.
>
> At a minimum I think the "put_c", "put_s", etc... should be implemented
> and the "putc", "puts", etc... identified as obsolete syntax.
>
> I realize these changes would effect every piece of Ruby code but the
> language is still fairly young (at least with respect to it's version
> number) and since it sounds like version 2.0 is going to break a few
> things it might be a good time to adjust a few names and conventions.
> I'm sure a little Ruby script using regular expressions could rename
> everything quite easily.  Alternately, new versions of Ruby could have a
> command line switch to run the old syntax but by default would run the
> new syntax.
>
> I apologize in advance for irritating anyone... I'm still new to Ruby
> and maybe I misunderstood some of the intentions behind the naming
> conventions.  It's because Ruby is so consistent/smart in many other
> areas (I love the OO goodness) that this stuff (don't get me started on
> Find.find() or Benchmark.bm()) bugs me.  I love promoting Ruby with
> co-workers but can't help but mention (or get asked) why some things
> like this look kind of silly.
>
> Just a thought, have a good day everyone!
>
> Michael
>
>


-- 
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