From: Stefano Mioli <stefano.mioli@...>
Date: 2010-10-20T05:02:51+09:00
Subject: Separator in $PATH

Hello everyone,
	Unix-like operating systems use a colon to separate each directory in 
the PATH, while Windows uses a semicolon.

The question is: is there some class in the Ruby library that knows 
about this difference?
Or do I have to resort to something like the following?

	if RUBY_PLATFORM =~ /(win|w)32$/
	  # ...
	end

I'm asking this question because I need to figure out if a given 
executable is in the path and, if it does, retrieve its full path.
So I whipped up this one-liner which seems to work as expected (except 
on Windows, of course):

ENV["PATH"].split(":").collect {|p| File.join(p, "foo")}.keep_if{|p| 
File.exist? p}.first

where "foo" is the name of the executable.
While we're at it, can someone think of a better / more idiomatic way to 
do it?

Obviously, simply trying to run the executable is not an option.

Thanks in advance.


-- 
Stefano