From: Paul Brannan <pbrannan@...>
Date: 2002-10-30T03:56:04+09:00
Subject: Re: method-call style (was Re: Snippet: Tiny Featureless Ruby Web Server)

On Wed, Oct 30, 2002 at 01:11:43AM +0900, dblack@candle.superlink.net wrote:
> But since attributes are retrieved by method calls in Ruby, that
> distinction doesn't hold.  Or, to put it another way, since all cases
> of obj.message in Ruby are the foo() case, the () doesn't actually add
> any information or tell us anything.  I guess that's why it leapt off
> the screen at me a bit.

In Ruby, attributes are method calls.  However, they are a special type
of method call.  Attributes are guaranteed to never modify the object.
And if the object isn't modified, then the attribute should remain the
same.  I think the distinction is supported by the semantics of
attributes, if not by the language itself.

Paul