From: quixoticsycophant@... (Jeff Mitchell)
Date: 2003-09-07T04:13:18+09:00
Subject: proposal for a named parameter prefix

def foo(*array)
  array.each do |a|
    # ...
  end
end

Aha there's an asterisk so we know it's an array.

def foo2(&block)
  @callback = block
  # ..
end

Aha there's an ampersand so we know it's a block.

def foo3(what_is_this)
  # ... 
  # (many lines of code)
  # ...
  what_is_this.each |key,value|
    # ...
  end
end

Hm what is what_is_this? <scroll scroll scroll> Aha I see it's the
ol' named-parameter thing.

But wait there's more!  I can't do

foo4(some, variable, number, of, elements,
     :then => some, :named => parameters)

because such a definition

foo4(*array, params)
  # ...
end

would be illegal since params would be splatted into the array.

I propose:

def foo4(*array,%params,&block)
  array.each do |a|
    # ...
  end
  params.each do |key, value|
    # ...
  end
  @callback = block
end

from above,

def foo3(%what_is_this)
  # ...
end

Aha there's a percent sign so we know it's a hash.

It'll be backward compatible too.  You'll just get the current
behavior when there's no percent sign.  Also, the hash in

foo4( { :a => 4, :b => 5, :c => 6 } )

will be treated as a normal array argument.

To summerize, "%" gets us two things

  (1) a nice signal to let everyone know a named parameter hash is
      there

  (2) the ability to mix variable-length arguments with named
      parameters (in a nice way)

--
Jeff Mitchell