From: "Llelan D." <lists@...>
Date: 2012-05-21T16:01:30+09:00
Subject: Re: New to Ruby Need a little help from the pros.

If you installed the reference implementation at
"http://www.ruby-lang.org", you will find a Documentation folder in the
Start:Ruby193-pxxx folder in your Windows Start menu. This will include
a help file that documents the API of the core and standard libraries,
which includes all of the basic methods and classes), and a PDF called
"The Book of Ruby", which is a Guide to learning the language and the
most-used core APIs.

The bad news is that all Ruby documentation is crap. Rife with:
 * Tutorials that only allow you to recreate the examples without any
knowledge of how to expand on them.
 * Erroneous and deprecated information.
 * Incomplete information and bad presumptions by the author as to how
everyone ought to program.
 * And, worst of all, a complete disregard for how each element is
INTENDED to be used. They simply tell you the name, input, and output
with no clue as to why it exists or was implemented in that fashion to
begin with.

In other words, the same as for any other language.

The good news is: Your project is exactly the type of algorithm Ruby was
designed to implement.
 * Look up the String class in the API helpfile and scroll down to the
succ() or next() methods (Truly awful names). That method will increment
the value of your string a-z from the last character to the first,
preserving case. So 'az'.next returns 'aaa'.
 * Using the record separator variable "$\=':'" with the print() and
gets() methods will easily write and read words separated by the ':'
delimiter.

That should get you rolling downhill into freeway traffic in no time.
Enjoy!

-- 
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