From: Robert Jackson <robert.w.jackson@...>
Date: 2013-07-02T06:10:21+09:00
Subject: Re: Why the use of a pound (#) sign with Enumerable

These sorts of things are somewhat difficult to google for (I tried to find a nice article to reference, but couldn't find one quickly.), so hopefully this helps...

The methods themselves do not have a '#' in front of them.  

The '#' is usually used to indicate an instance method and often '.' is used to indicate a class/module method.

So given the following class:

class FooBar
  def self.say_hello
    puts 'hello from a class method'
  end

  def say_hello
    puts 'hello from an instance method'
  end
end

FooBar#say_hello references the instance method.
FooBar.say_hello references the class method.

Robert Jackson

  -- twitter:  rwjblue
  -- github: rjackson


On Jul 1, 2013, at 4:02 PM, Ruby Student <ruby.student@gmail.com> wrote:

> Team,
> 
> Please be easy on me, but I was wondering why methods that belong to the Enumerable class have a # (pound) sign. For instance: 
> 
> 	• #all?
> 	• #any?
> 	• #chunk
> 	• #collect
> Etc.
> 
> What is the meaining of the # there?
> 
> Thank you
> 
> -- 
> Ruby Student