From: Mike Campbell <michael_s_campbell@...>
Date: 2002-04-24T23:10:34+09:00
Subject: RE: Numberic#prev

> I think you meant Integer#prev.
>
> I'm not sure how much useful it is.  And I'm (little bit) afraid of it
> might cause request for String#prev, which is way difficult to define.

As a point of reference, perl has avoided this issue by just not providing a
(useful) string decrementer.  I mention this only to show that the behavior is a
known one in a large part of the scripting community, not to endorse it (nor
demonize it).

#!/perl/bin/perl

$x = "foo";

$x++;  # => "fop"

$x--;   # => -1; since "fop" in a numeric context is 0.