From: Dan Doel <djd15@...>
Date: 2004-04-04T22:03:49+09:00
Subject: Re: deciding between ruby and python

Ah, yes. Upon going back and reading I had it backwards. Serves me right for
trying to rely on my memory alone.

I'm conflicted in my opinions. On the one hand, perhaps it'd be good for #join
to only use #to_str to convert, since that means objects are allowed to be
auto-converted, and that would be appropriate for duck typing (that is, the
object is saying it acts like a string through this conversion). Calling #to_s
doesn't mean the object is "supposed" to be interchangeable with a string.

On the other hand, we could say #join takes an array of objects with the
method #to_s, and that'd be appropriate as well.  Really, I don't see the
danger of this, since when I #join, I want a string. I doubt having it throw
an exception on non-string-interoperable objects will catch real errors on a
regular basis. The argument that it will seems like a red herring to me.

Luckily, my opinion doesn't matter at all. :)

- Dan