From: Hal Fulton <hal9000@...>
Date: 2003-12-14T23:33:49+09:00
Subject: Re: inplace assignment

nobu.nokada@softhome.net wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> At Sun, 14 Dec 2003 15:50:54 +0900,
> Hal Fulton wrote:
> 
>>>>In other words I want to change what q "contains" rather then alter its 
>>>>reference. With an array for example you can do that with #replace. In 
>>>>particular I'm interesed in doing this with constants.
>>>
>>>
>>>Array#replace isn't concerned with constants.
>>>
>>>  A = [1]
>>>  A.replace([2])
>>>  p A[0] # => 2
>>
>>Thanks for pointing this out. I don't think I ever noticed that.
>>
>>Should this give an error?
> 
> 
> No.  A constant in Ruby is a name which can point to only
> particular object.  Nothing related to the container's
> contents.
> 

Actually, I completely misread your example. I already understood this
phenomenon.

I thought that the assignment was silently discarded, i.e., I read this
as:

   A = [1]
   A.replace([2])
   p A[0] # => 1

Sorry for being stupid. :)

Hal