From: Gavin Sinclair <gsinclair@...>
Date: 2003-04-12T20:23:56+09:00
Subject: Re: [BUG] "illegal radix 1"

On Friday, April 11, 2003, 5:26:48 PM, Daniel wrote:

>> |>> "2".to_i *1.1
>> |ArgumentError: illegal radix 1
>> |        from (irb):2:in `to_i'
>> |        from (irb):2
>> |>> "2".to_i * 1.1
>> |=> 2.2
>> 
>> "2".to_i *1.1 is parsed as "2".to_i(*1.1).  Try -w if you have doubt.

> Yes, I figured it was something like that.  But don't you think that Ruby 
> should be able to figure that out?
> I don't know.  I don't think I've seen this problem in other high-level 
> languages.  I guess that this is part of how I would expect a high-level 
> language to "stay out of my way" and let me focus on the problem I am 
> actually trying to solve.

Your point about high-level languages is good, but this is the cost of
Ruby's power.  Most high-level languages are pretty simple and
gutless, making it easy to normalise the input.

Fortunately, as Matz said, the -w flag picks up things like this
easily.  I use it as a habit.

The only time I really have trouble finding where a parse (or similar)
error occurs is when I've left out a closing bracket or something.

Gavin