From: Austin Ziegler <austin@...>
Date: 2002-12-01T23:41:29+09:00
Subject: Re: Ruby Document

On Sun, 1 Dec 2002 05:27:58 +0900, Shannon Fang wrote:
> And in ruby, attr_reader :name, and def name... end, while in
> Delphi, it is "property name". Again delphi is easier to
> comprehend, and hence harder to forget. Of course, when you know
> the meaning of attr_reader it is as simple as "property", but for
> beginer, like me, who knows oop, but new to ruby, it doesn't make
> sense at the beginning.

Shannon,

Note that:

  class Foo
    attr_reader :bar
  end

is only the same as:

  Type Foo = Class
    Property  bar:  Variant Read getBar;
  End;

For a read/write "property", you need:

  class Foo
    attr_accessor :bar
  end

Both attr_reader and attr_accessor are methods which produce syntax
sugar. It is no different than doing:

  class Foo
    def bar; @bar; end
    def bar=(b); @bar = b; end
  end

Considering the attr_* methods to be the same as Property values in
Delphi (or C#) is, IMO, a mistake.

-austin
-- Austin Ziegler, austin@halostatue.ca on 2002.12.01 at 09.34.18