From: "yermej@..." <yermej@...>
Date: 2007-09-28T03:45:06+09:00
Subject: Re: gsub-ing each character

On Sep 27, 12:18 pm, Michael Linfield <globyy3...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> I want to convert certain letters to numbers on a gets.chomp..
> my initial approach was this----
>
> words = gets.chomp
>  new = words.each {|p| p.gsub(/[h]/, '00')}
>
> puts new
>
> #####
> however this doesnt work the miracle :)
>
> new = words.gsub(/[h]/, '00')
>
> puts new
>
> ##### this works perfectly, but the problem occurs if i want to gsub
> more than one character as if i have new = another.gsub then puts new
> only outputs the last gsub.
>
> Ideas?
>
> Thanks!
> --
> Posted viahttp://www.ruby-forum.com/.

Normally, you'd use String#tr for something like this, but since you
want to replace single characters with multiple characters, you might
try something like this:

subs = {
  'h' => '00',
  'i' => '01',
  'j' => '02',
}

new = gets.chomp

subs.inject(new) {|acc, sub| acc.gsub(sub[0], sub[1])} unless new.nil?

For something more similar to what you're already doing, you can chain
the #gsub calls together:

new.gsub('h', '00').gsub('i', '01').gsub('j', '02') unless new.nil?

This may or may not run faster than my first solution, but the first
is easier to code/maintain.

Jeremy