[ruby-talk:5033] Having problems with Net::HTTP::do_finish

I just started using Ruby yesterday, and I'm having trouble with my
first real program.  The following minimal example demonstrates the
problem I'm encountering:

-- foo.rb --
require 'net/http'
Net::HTTP.start ('www.ruby-lang.org') { |x| }

-- results --
d:/src $ ruby foo.rb 
C:/APP/RUBY/lib/ruby/1.6/net/protocol.rb:578:in `sysread': End of file reached (EOFError)
	from C:/APP/RUBY/lib/ruby/1.6/net/protocol.rb:578:in `fill_rbuf'
	from C:/APP/RUBY/lib/ruby/1.6/net/protocol.rb:523:in `readuntil'
	from C:/APP/RUBY/lib/ruby/1.6/net/protocol.rb:533:in `readline'
	from C:/APP/RUBY/lib/ruby/1.6/net/http.rb:751:in `get_reply'
	from C:/APP/RUBY/lib/ruby/1.6/net/http.rb:626:in `get_response'
	from C:/APP/RUBY/lib/ruby/1.6/net/http.rb:359:in `connecting'
	from C:/APP/RUBY/lib/ruby/1.6/net/http.rb:299:in `head2'
	from C:/APP/RUBY/lib/ruby/1.6/net/http.rb:340:in `do_finish'
	from C:/APP/RUBY/lib/ruby/1.6/net/protocol.rb:179:in `finish'
	from C:/APP/RUBY/lib/ruby/1.6/net/protocol.rb:172:in `start'
	from C:/APP/RUBY/lib/ruby/1.6/net/http.rb:236:in `start'
	from foo.rb:3

d:/src $ ruby -v
ruby 1.6.0 (2000-09-19) [i586-mswin32]

(For what it's worth, http.rb and protocol.rb are both version 1.1.28.)

The exception appears to occur upon closing the HTTP connection, in the
implicit finish() when Net::Protocol::start() is used as an iterator.
(The same thing happens if I call start() and finish() explicitly.)  It
appears to be attempting to close the connection with the following
line

  head2 '/', { 'Connection' => 'close' }

and failing when it doesn't receive a response.  I don't yet understand
HTTP (and protocol.rb and http.rb) enough to immediately know where
the problem lies (e.g., is it unexpected behavior to encounter EOF
upon closing a connection?).  Any pointers would be appreciated.

-- 
                 Dan Schmidt | http://www.dfan.org
Honest Bob CD now available! | http://www.dfan.org/honestbob/cd.html