From: matz@... (Yukihiro Matsumoto)
Date: 2003-02-14T10:15:52+09:00
Subject: Re: Why does Array#compact! return the array, but uniq! return a count?

Hi,

In message "Re: Why does Array#compact! return the array, but uniq! return a count?"
    on 03/02/13, Tom Payne <google@tompayne.org> writes:

|> Array's bang methods return nil if it does not modify the receiver, so
|> that chaining is not encouraged.
|
|I'm not suggesting a change, but what is the rationale for this?

Because their's no cheaper way to detect modifies, without making
copies.

|IMHO, chaining is one of the most useful aspects of ruby -- multiple
|lines of code can be folded into one. With chaining you're generally
|not interested in the intermediate results (otherwise you'd store them
|in a variable somewhere) and so in-place modification is more
|efficient since you don't have to create lots of intermediate objects
|that are then immediately discarded.

Use non-bang methods (bit slower, but safer) for chaining.  Ugly bangs
are warning mark for side effects.

							matz.