From: Robert Dober <robert.dober@...>
Date: 2007-07-01T20:43:09+09:00
Subject: Re: simple math operations on arrays

On 7/1/07, baptiste Augui� <ba208@exeter.ac.uk> wrote:
> yep, i do want (-2/3). Oh, i see, is 2/3 == 1 for Ruby?? OMG this is
> mad !
No 0 I am a declared egghead already, but it was the issue nonetheless.

It is not mad for Computer Scientists only for real Scientists ;)
You have heard the prime number joke before, have you not?

Well here it goes spamming the group, but it *really* explains the
problem of expectation and behavior:

Theorem: All odd numbers are prime.
Proof
Theoretical Physician: 1 is odd but not prime, theorem fails!
***I spare you 42 disciplines here***
Computer Scientist (that is me folks do not holler ;): 1 prime, 2
prime, 3 prime Quod Erat Demonstrandum.

Seriously now, in many fields 2/3 ==> 0 is much more useful than ==>
0.66666..., not in yours I guess. BTW Lua and Perl do it your way;
Phyton does it our way.

Cheers
Robert

-- 
I always knew that one day Smalltalk would replace Java.
I just didn't know it would be called Ruby
-- Kent Beck