From: ChrisH <chris.hulan@...>
Date: 2007-04-04T23:20:09+09:00
Subject: Re: Problem Extracting Array Values

On Apr 4, 10:02 am, Dustin Anderson <rubyfo...@dustinanderson.com>
wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> I'm trying to iterate through an array and pull each value into a view
> on my Rails app.  The array is stored in a MySQL database.
>
> The array is in a varchar (string) column named "blocks" with the value:
> ["journal", "about", "news"]
>
> I'm trying to pull each value out one at a time.
>
> If I try to access the array with something like this...:
> <%= @blocks[0] %>
>
> ..the view returns a numeric value:
> 91
>
> I'm totally confused as to why I can't extract the values out of the
> array.  It works fine in IRB:
> irb(main):004:0> @blocks = ["journal", "about"]
> => ["journal", "about"]
> irb(main):005:0> @blocks[0]
> => "journal"
> irb(main):006:0>
>
> Is there some reason why I can't get the "journal" string out of the
> array?
>
> Thanks in advance for your help!
> Dustin
>
> --
> Posted viahttp://www.ruby-forum.com/.

As you say, its stored as a String, and String defines [] to return
the ASCII value of the character
at the given index.  If you put 91.chr into IRB you'll see it is the
'[' character.

You need to convert your String into an actual array before you can
access each element.

Maybe:
eval(@blocks)[0]

Cheers
Chris