From: "Hal E. Fulton" <hal9000@...>
Date: 2003-08-09T09:26:40+09:00
Subject: Re: =~ obsolete?

----- Original Message -----
From: "Martin Weber" <Ephaeton@gmx.net>
To: "ruby-talk ML" <ruby-talk@ruby-lang.org>
Sent: Friday, August 08, 2003 7:17 PM
Subject: Re: =~ obsolete?


> > Why do you need or want string-string as opposed
> > to string-regex? Not a flame, just a question.
> >
>
> Dunno, maybe because your (mmv, too) principle of least surprise (yes yes
> I'm not argueing based on it, just offering a view!) told you that finding
> a substring in a string doesn't need regexes which smell like being
awfully
> slower than plain string searches and the hope that
>
> string =~ string
>
> is something like
>
> string[string]
>
> At least that's why I'd try to use it (if not someone recently pointed out
> string[string] (again!))...

But that's not the same thing...

  "abc" =~ "c"    # 2 (index)
  "abc"["c"]      # "c"

But more importantly, the second string is not
a substring; it's really a regex stored in a
string:

  "abc" =~ ".."   # 0
  "abc"[".."]     # nil

Perhaps the rationale for the obsolescence is that you shouldn't
pretend to be using a string when you're really using a regex.

Hal

--
Hal Fulton
hal9000@hypermetrics.com