From: shenry <stuarthenry@...>
Date: 2009-10-31T02:10:24+09:00
Subject: Merging hashes using both symbols and strings as keys

I'm trying to merge to hashes, one using symbols as keys (the defined
default values for my class) and the other using strings as keys
(taken from the params hash).

default = { :name => "Joe", :age => 50 }

params = { "name" => "Bill" }

new_hash = default.merge(params)
>> { :name => "Joe", :age => 50, "name" => "Bill }

What's the Ruby way to handle this so that it overwrites :name with
"name"? Do I need to implement a stringify_keys or symbolize_keys
method like in Rails? I'd like to avoid using strings as the keys in
my default hash.

Any help greatly appreciated.

Stu