From: Marcin 'Qrczak' Kowalczyk Date: 2002-09-22T02:01:07+09:00 Subject: Re: Is better to subclass or to add methods to an existing class? Fri, 20 Sep 2002 14:40:35 +0900, Christoph pisze: > This runs squarely against a prominent argument of the ``anti > multi-method camp'' that Ruby's ``open classes'' (a very descriptive > term btw.) somehow reduce the need of method overloading. > > Apparently the exact opposite seems to be true: Method overloading > (preferable in the incarnation of full blown multi-methods) and > ''class openness' seem to form a very strong synergy ... It seems logical to me. If methods are standalone objects, it's easy to do both multidispatch (looking up classes inside a method, not methods inside a class - lookup is more complicated but there is no problem *where* to look up) and creating methods anytime (classes aren't modified so it makes no sense to freeze them; they are methods which are modified). -- __("< Marcin Kowalczyk \__/ qrczak@knm.org.pl ^^ http://qrnik.knm.org.pl/~qrczak/