From: Robert Klemme <shortcutter@...>
Date: 2012-07-04T15:51:18+09:00
Subject: Re: if x.condition, set x to y

On Wed, Jul 4, 2012 at 2:18 AM, Sam Duncan <sduncan@wetafx.co.nz> wrote:

> Or you could do;
>
> actor_data['biography'].empty?&&  actor_data['biography'] = 'Biography not
> available'

Only that this won't work if actor_data is a Hash without default
value because NilClass#empty? does not exist:

irb(main):002:0> {}['biography'].empty?
NoMethodError: undefined method `empty?' for nil:NilClass
        from (irb):2
        from /opt/bin/irb19:12:in `<main>'

Methinks this is actually the best and most idiomatic way to do it:

actor_data['biography'] ||= 'Biography not available'

Better learn common idioms right from the start.


I do have another issue with this though: if that string is placed in
the Hash the information is lost that this value wasn't initially
available.  IMHO it's much better to do the replacement when printing,
e.g.

%w{name biography country}.each do |field|
  printf "%-20s: %s\n", field, actor_data[field] || "#{field} not available"
end

or just

%w{name biography country}.each do |field|
  printf "%-20s: %s\n", field, actor_data[field] || 'not available'
end

Btw wutang, IRB is a great too to try these things out.

Kind regards

robert

-- 
remember.guy do |as, often| as.you_can - without end
http://blog.rubybestpractices.com/