From: Tom Sawyer <transami@...>
Date: 2002-08-10T05:03:16+09:00
Subject: Re: ambiguity between local variable assignment and writter method

On Fri, 2002-08-09 at 13:30, Dave Thomas wrote:
> This is an interesting issue: should internal users go via the setter
> method or access the instance variable directly. Clearly it depends on
> the circumstances, but I often find myself writing accessors that do
> things such as lazy evaluation, or which set dirty flags for
> persistent objects, and where I really do need to go via the method
> form. For those times, it's nice to have a shortcut, but it isn't
> something I'd fight hard for... :)

well i think the shortcut of .setter is really backways-around, not
really fumigating the "smell". though certainly it is at least a bit
cleaner.

the fact that all other methods get picked up without using self, just
smacks of EXCEPTION. the exception for #setter= methods, and exceptions
always smack of smell.

why couldn't ruby just check to see if there was such a setter method
first, prior to assuming it a local variable assignment? the only
consequence of this would be that you could not use local variable names
identical to your method names. something i tend to do anyway.

~transami