From: AW <sturmpanzer@...>
Date: 2002-08-22T04:53:29+09:00
Subject: Re: the power of ruby

Your version runs about 10X faster than mine. but i see why now.
I had far to many writes to IO. 
The precedence is a bit confusing at first. I wasnt aware that the
times{} must complete for going to downto{}.
this is a wonderfull example. I think I may be a bit too timid about 
truely exploiting Ruby's power. 


>
>> I keep looking at the last line and I cant seem to grasp its
>> relationship, I mean, If the first set of '{}' are containing the loop
>> from the '.times' method, how do the second set relate?
>
>The .times method returns an int, try this :
>
>C:\> ruby -e "puts 5.times{}"
>5
>C:\>
>
>The block in curly brace: { |i| do_dot(i) } is only a parameter to .times.
>Imagine it thus:
>
>WIDTH.times( block_in_curly_brace)
>
>Since the return value of  this function is an int you can cascade it to get
>
>WIDTH.times( block_in_curly_brace).downto(0) { |i| do_dot(i) }
>
>> Now i'm really confused. Thank you! ;-)
>
>Hope I have not confused you more ;-)
>
>-- Shanko
>
>>
>> >Yours is rather succinct, but I find that you can often capitalize
>> >on return values of methods to shorten.  Shorten, right?  You're
>> >looking for shorter?
>>
>> Im looking for exactly what you gave. different ways to express the
>> same output in Ruby. Shorter, longer, obsfucated, clear.
>> I just hope others will chime in and give some examples of their own
>> style.
>>
>> >
>> >Here's one:
>> >
>> >  WIDTH = 78
>> >  def do_dot( i )
>> >    puts( ( " " * i ) + "*" )
>> >  end
>> >  loop {
>> >    WIDTH.times { |i| do_dot(i) }.downto(0) { |i| do_dot(i) }
>> >  }
>> >
>> >Check ya later.
>> >
>> >_why
>> >
>> >AW (sturmpanzer@metacrawler.com) wrote:
>> >>
>> >> Here is my unimaginitive attempt.
>> >>
>> >> [code]==============================================
>> >> WIDTH=78;
>> >> def do_dot(i)
>> >>        i.times{print " "}
>> >>        puts "*";
>> >> end
>> >> loop{
>> >>        0.upto(WIDTH-1){|i|
>> >>                do_dot(i);
>> >>        }
>> >>        WIDTH.downto(1){|i|
>> >>                do_dot(i);
>> >>        }
>> >> }
>> >> [/code]=============================================
>> >
>>
>
>