From: Gregory Seidman <gsslist+ruby@...>
Date: 2008-07-01T21:50:25+09:00
Subject: Re: Dynamic Variables

On Tue, Jul 01, 2008 at 06:45:48PM +0900, Marc Heiler wrote:
> Is there any way in ruby to create dynamic variables?
> 
> counter = 52
> box#{counter} = "cat and dogs"
> 
> There would be then a new variable
> box52
> 
> Note that this is not a question whether someone should do it or not -
> this is solely whether it is doable or not. Until today I thought it is
> somehow possible with eval but I failed, so I assume it is not possible.

I'm going to give you exactly what you didn't ask for: why this is a bad
idea. This is a discussion about Perl rather than Ruby, but it remains
relevant: http://perl.plover.com/varvarname.html

See the subsequent parts of the series for further discussion.

--Greg