From: Joel VanderWerf <vjoel@...>
Date: 2004-05-12T02:29:43+09:00
Subject: Re: Proposal: Object#send(nil) -> self

Gavin Sinclair wrote:
> A quick one.  I see some sense in Object#send accepting 'nil' as the
> message.  You send no message, you get the plain object.  Does anyone
> agree?
> 
> #send is clearly useful when you want to vary the message sent to an
> object based on some condition.  Sometimes the default condition is to
> send no message, but that can't be coded as elegantly.
> 
> For example:
> 
>   date_colour_msg =
>     case Date.today - date
>     when 0 then :red
>     when 1 then :yellow
>     when 2..5 then :green
>     else
>       nil   # Default: whatever the normal colour is.
>     end
> 
>   date_str = date.to_s.send(date_colour_msg)

What about something like this (untested)?

   class Object
     def myself
       self
     end
   end

   date_colour_msg =
     case Date.today - date
     when 0 then :red
     when 1 then :yellow
     when 2..5 then :green
     else
       :myself   # Default: whatever the normal colour is.
     end

   date_str = date.to_s.send(date_colour_msg)