From: "David A. Black" <dblack@...>
Date: 2007-09-30T20:30:23+09:00
Subject: Re: a = Dog.new # a is not a pointer and not a reference?

Hi --

On Sun, 30 Sep 2007, Robert Dober wrote:

> On 9/30/07, SpringFlowers AutumnMoon <summercoolness@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> how about just a.set_value(3) vs a->set_value(3).  what i mean is just
>> the "." and "->" difference.  using a "." in Ruby and "->" in C or C++.
>> If I think of "a" as a pointer and "." as "->", will that get in trouble
>> and have any discrepancy for other things.
> Yup 'cause '.' is not dereferencing period (pun intended). It is
> sending a message
>
> x.a is almost equivalent to
> x.send :a.
>
> Variables in Ruby are references, period again ;) but you cannot
> dereference them.

And I'd add that bareword identifiers are sometimes *not* variables,
so x.a can mean something even if x is a method call.


David

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