From: rio4ruby <Christopher.Kleckner@...>
Date: 2007-07-17T18:10:04+09:00
Subject: Re: The Pebble in the Ruby Shoe

On Jul 16, 4:57 pm, "Robert Parker" <rlp1...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 7/16/07, Raphael Gillett <r.gill...@rational.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>
>
> > The pebble in the Ruby shoe is the counter-intuitive use of indexing of
> > elements of arrays, strings, etc., from 0 to n-1 instead of the more
> > natural 1 to n.   Like prisoners who have got used to their chains, the
> > Ruby community seems to have meekly accepted this impediment to clear
> > thinking.   It is particularly puzzling that Ruby should hobble its
> > users in this way, because it is manifestly unnecessary (e.g., Fortran
> > and Pascal don't do it).
>
> Anyone who has serious difficulty with 0 based arrays should consider
> other employment. Food waiting, bar tending or similar would be a
> better choice.

As a former bartender, I take umbrage at this remark. We all used zero
based indexing.