From: mortee <mortee.lists@...>
Date: 2007-11-06T21:50:38+09:00
Subject: Re: string to symbol

Fernando Cacciola wrote:
> Hi people,
> 
> Is there a way to "intern" a string so that it becomes denoted by a symbol?
> 
> Something like:
> 
> # This doesn't work as I wrote it, I know
> :repetitive_message <= "blah blah blah"
> 
> puts :repetitive_message
> puts :repetitive_message
> puts :repetitive_message
> puts :repetitive_message

If you use

puts :"blah blah blah"

then no matter how many times you write it, the symbol literal will
reference the same symbol (as long as the literal is the same, of
course). Also, you can assign either a simple string, or a symbol to a
variable, thus reusing it without repeating in the source.

my_str = "some string"
my_sym = :"some symbol"

puts my_str
puts my_sym

mortee