From: Dave Thomas <Dave@...>
Date: 2000-08-08T08:18:22-05:00
Subject: [ruby-talk:04344] Re: DRY and embedded docs.

Hugh Sasse Staff Elec Eng <hgs@dmu.ac.uk> writes:

> If I have a here document in some ruby program:
>... 
> How can I get this text into a 
> =begin
> =end
> section so I can have it as documentation, without breaking the
> Don't Repeat Yourself rule?
> .....

And a darn fine rule it is too.. ;-)

This is kind of tacky, but it does work--both rd and the program can
access the same explanatory text:

     def usage
       copying = false
       while DATA.gets
         break if /^=end/
         if /^=begin/
           copying = true
         else
           print if copying
         end
       end
     end

     usage() unless ARGV.length >= 2

     puts "Body of program..."

     __END__
     =begin

     Here is my documentation.

       prog  [ option ... ]  file1 file2

     Options:

      -a   all
      -b   before
      -c   change

     =end


Now, I just had a thought... Wouldn't it be neat if rdtool had an
option that did just this, so you could say

     RD::usage

and it would format up the text neatly for you?



Dave