From: Robert Klemme <shortcutter@...>
Date: 2009-04-22T15:25:05+09:00
Subject: Re: Is there a better way to do this?

On 22.04.2009 00:26, Paul Mckibbin wrote:
> Robert Klemme wrote:
>> If I understand the rest of your post correctly it is not exactly the
>> same structure but rather similarly structured data in two different
>> data structures (custom classes and XML DOM).
> 
> True, but it is a 3rd party object library that I don't have access to 
> other than through OLE calls or file storage.

I see.  But: if file storage means XML then you can still create a data 
structure which responds to the same set of methods as the OLE version.

An alternative approach to modifying Hash is to wrap the whole beast in 
something that exhibits the same interface as the OLE version.

require 'delegate'

class HashWrap < SimpleDelegator
   def method_missing(s,*a,&b)
     key = s.to_s

     if a.empty? and __getobj__.key? key
       res = __getobj__[key]
       res = self.class.new(res) if Hash === res
       res
     else
       super
     end
   end
end

h = {"foo" => {"x"=>456}, "bar" => 2}
s = HashWrap.new h

p s.foo
p s.foo.x
p s.bar
p s.not_there


Cheers

	robert