Continuing the "Hidden features of ..." meme, let's share the lesser-known but useful features of Ruby programming language.
Try to limit this discussion with core Ruby, without any Ruby on Rails stuff.
See also:
(Please, just one hidden feature per answer.)
Thank you
I find using the define_method command to dynamically generate methods to be quite interesting and not as well known. For example:
((0..9).each do |n|
define_method "press_#{n}" do
@number = @number.to_i * 10 + n
end
end
The above code uses the 'define_method' command to dynamically create the methods "press1" through "press9." Rather then typing all 10 methods which essentailly contain the same code, the define method command is used to generate these methods on the fly as needed.
The send() method is a general-purpose method that can be used on any Class or Object in Ruby. If not overridden, send() accepts a string and calls the name of the method whose string it is passed. For example, if the user clicks the “Clr” button, the ‘press_clear’ string will be sent to the send() method and the ‘press_clear’ method will be called. The send() method allows for a fun and dynamic way to call functions in Ruby.
%w(7 8 9 / 4 5 6 * 1 2 3 - 0 Clr = +).each do |btn|
button btn, :width => 46, :height => 46 do
method = case btn
when /[0-9]/: 'press_'+btn
when 'Clr': 'press_clear'
when '=': 'press_equals'
when '+': 'press_add'
when '-': 'press_sub'
when '*': 'press_times'
when '/': 'press_div'
end
number.send(method)
number_field.replace strong(number)
end
end
I talk more about this feature in Blogging Shoes: The Simple-Calc Application
Download Ruby 1.9 source, and issue make golf, then you can do things like this:
make golf
./goruby -e 'h'
# => Hello, world!
./goruby -e 'p St'
# => StandardError
./goruby -e 'p 1.tf'
# => 1.0
./goruby19 -e 'p Fil.exp(".")'
"/home/manveru/pkgbuilds/ruby-svn/src/trunk"
Read the golf_prelude.c for more neat things hiding away.
use anything that responds to ===(obj) for case comparisons:
case foo
when /baz/
do_something_with_the_string_matching_baz
when 12..15
do_something_with_the_integer_between_12_and_15
when lambda { |x| x % 5 == 0 }
# only works in Ruby 1.9 or if you alias Proc#call as Proc#===
do_something_with_the_integer_that_is_a_multiple_of_5
when Bar
do_something_with_the_instance_of_Bar
when some_object
do_something_with_the_thing_that_matches_some_object
end
Module (and thus Class), Regexp, Date, and many other classes define an instance method :===(other), and can all be used.
Thanks to Farrel for the reminder of Proc#call being aliased as Proc#=== in Ruby 1.9.
Peter Cooper has a good list of Ruby tricks. Perhaps my favorite of his is allowing both single items and collections to be enumerated. (That is, treat a non-collection object as a collection containing just that object.) It looks like this:
[*items].each do |item|
# ...
end
How about opening a file based on ARGV[0]?
readfile.rb:
$<.each_line{|l| puts l}
ruby readfile.rb testfile.txt
It's a great shortcut for writing one-off scripts. There's a whole mess of pre-defined variables that most people don't know about. Use them wisely (read: don't litter a code base you plan to maintain with them, it can get messy).
A lot of the magic you see in Rubyland has to do with metaprogramming, which is simply writing code that writes code for you. Ruby's attr_accessor, attr_reader, and attr_writer are all simple metaprogramming, in that they create two methods in one line, following a standard pattern. Rails does a whole lot of metaprogramming with their relationship-management methods like has_one and belongs_to.
But it's pretty simple to create your own metaprogramming tricks using class_eval to execute dynamically-written code.
The following example allows a wrapper object to forwards certain methods along to an internal object:
class Wrapper
attr_accessor :internal
def self.forwards(*methods)
[*methods].each do |method|
class_eval("
def #{method}(*args, &blk)
self.internal.send(#{method.to_sym.inspect}, *args, &blk)
end
")
end
end
forwards :to_i, :length, :split
end
w = Wrapper.new
w.internal = "12 13 14"
puts w.to_i
puts w.length
puts w.split('1')
Note the use of [*methods] (pointed out elsewhere in this thread) to enumerate over the arguments given. Then, for each of those given, we use class_eval to create a new method whose job it is to send the message along, including all arguments and blocks.
A great resource for metaprogramming issues is Why the Lucky Stuff's "Seeing Metaprogramming Clearly".
From Ruby 1.9 Proc#=== is an alias to Proc#call, which means Proc objects can be used in case statements like so:
def multiple_of(factor)
Proc.new{|product| product.modulo(factor).zero?}
end
case number
when multiple_of(3)
puts "Multiple of 3"
when multiple_of(7)
puts "Multuple of 7"
end
Fool some class or module telling it has required something that it really hasn't required:
$" << "something"
This is useful for example when requiring A that in turns requires B but we don't need B in our code (and A won't use it either through our code):
For example, Backgroundrb's bdrb_test_helper requires 'test/spec', but you don't use it at all, so in your code:
$" << "test/spec"
require File.join(File.dirname(__FILE__) + "/../bdrb_test_helper")
The Symbol#to_proc function that Rails provides is really cool.
Instead of
Employee.collect { |emp| emp.name }
You can write:
Employee.collect(&:name)
Warning: this item was voted #1 Most Horrendous Hack of 2008, so use with care. Actually, avoid it like the plague, but it is most certainly Hidden Ruby.
Ever want a super-secret handshake operator for some unique operation in your code? Like playing code golf? Try operators like -~+~- or <--- That last one is used in the examples for reversing the order of an item.
I have nothing to do with the Superators Project beyond admiring it.
Another fun addition in 1.9 Proc functionality is Proc#curry which allows you to turn a Proc accepting n arguments into one accepting n-1. Here it is combined with the Proc#=== tip I mentioned above:
it_is_day_of_week = lambda{ |day_of_week, date| date.wday == day_of_week }
it_is_saturday = it_is_day_of_week.curry[6]
it_is_sunday = it_is_day_of_week.curry[0]
case Time.now
when it_is_saturday
puts "Saturday!"
when it_is_sunday
puts "Sunday!"
else
puts "Not the weekend"
end
Don't know how hidden this is, but I've found it useful when needing to make a Hash out of a one-dimensional array:
fruit = ["apple","red","banana","yellow"]
=> ["apple", "red", "banana", "yellow"]
Hash[*fruit]
=> {"apple"=>"red", "banana"=>"yellow"}
One trick I like it to use the splat(*) expander on objects other than Arrays. Here's an example on a regular expression match:
match, text, number = *"Something 981".match(/([A-z]*) ([0-9]*)/)
Other examples include:
a, b, c = *('A'..'Z')
Job = Struct.new(:name, :occupation)
tom = Job.new("Tom", "Developer")
name, occupation = *tom
Another tiny feature - convert a Fixnum into any base up to 36:
>> 1234567890.to_s(2)
=> "1001001100101100000001011010010"
>> 1234567890.to_s(8)
=> "11145401322"
>> 1234567890.to_s(16)
=> "499602d2"
>> 1234567890.to_s(24)
=> "6b1230i"
>> 1234567890.to_s(36)
=> "kf12oi"
One final one - in ruby you can use any character you want to delimit strings. Take the following code:
message = "My message"
contrived_example = "<div id=\"contrived\">#{message}</div>"
If you don't want to escape the double-quotes within the string, you can simply use a different delimiter:
contrived_example = %{<div id="contrived-example">#{message}</div>}
contrived_example = %[<div id="contrived-example">#{message}</div>]
As well as avoiding having to escape delimiters, you can use these delimiters for nicer multiline strings:
sql = %{
SELECT strings
FROM complicated_table
WHERE complicated_condition = '1'
}
Module methods that are declared as *module_function* will create copies of themselves as private instance methods in the class that includes the Module:
module M
def not!
'not!'
end
module_function :not!
end
class C
include M
def fun
not!
end
end
M.not! # => 'not!
C.new.fun # => 'not!'
C.new.not! # => NoMethodError: private method `not!' called for #<C:0x1261a00>
If you use *module_function* without any arguments, then any module methods that comes after the module_function statement will automatically become module_functions themselves.
module M
module_function
def not!
'not!'
end
def yea!
'yea!'
end
end
class C
include M
def fun
not! + ' ' + yea!
end
end
M.not! # => 'not!'
M.yea! # => 'yea!'
C.new.fun # => 'not! yea!'
Class.new()
Create a new class at run time. The argument can be a class to derive from, and the block is the class body. You might also want to look at const_set/const_get/const_defined? to get your new class properly registered, so that inspect prints out a name instead of a number.
Not something you need every day, but quite handy when you do.
Ruby has a call/cc mechanism allowing one to freely hop up and down the stack.
Simple example follows. This is certainly not how one would multiply a sequence in ruby, but it demonstrates how one might use call/cc to reach up the stack to short-circuit an algorithm. In this case, we're recursively multiplying a list of numbers until we either have seen every number or we see zero (the two cases where we know the answer). In the zero case, we can be arbitrarily deep in the list and terminate.
#!/usr/bin/env ruby
def rprod(k, rv, current, *nums)
puts "#{rv} * #{current}"
k.call(0) if current == 0 || rv == 0
nums.empty? ? (rv * current) : rprod(k, rv * current, *nums)
end
def prod(first, *rest)
callcc { |k| rprod(k, first, *rest) }
end
puts "Seq 1: #{prod(1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)}"
puts ""
puts "Seq 2: #{prod(1, 2, 0, 3, 4, 5, 6)}"
You can see the output here:
For a more complex example featuring continuations moving the other direction on the stack, read the source to Generator.
One of the cool things about ruby is that you can call methods and run code in places other languages would frown upon, such as in method or class definitions.
For instance, to create a class that has an unknown superclass until run time, i.e. is random, you could do the following:
class RandomSubclass < [Array, Hash, String, Fixnum, Float, TrueClass].choice
end
RandomSubclass.superclass # could output one of 6 different classes.
This uses the 1.8.7 Array#choice method, and the example is pretty contrived but you can see the power here.
Another cool example is the ability to put default parameter values that are non fixed (like other languages often demand):
def do_something_at(something, at = Time.now)
# ...
end
Of course the problem with the first example is that it is evaluated at definition time, not call time. So, once a superclass has been chosen, it stays that superclass for the remainder of the program.
However, in the second example, each time you call do_something_at, the at variable will be the time that the method was called (well, very very close to it)
class A
private
def my_private_method
puts 'private method called'
end
end
a = A.new
a.my_private_method # Raises exception saying private method was called
a.send :my_private_method # Calls my_private_method and prints private method called'
Hashes with default values! An array in this case.
parties = Hash.new {|hash, key| hash[key] = [] }
parties["Summer party"]
# => []
parties["Summer party"] << "Joe"
parties["Other party"] << "Jane"
Very useful in metaprogramming.
I find this useful in some scripts. It makes it possible to use environment variables directly, like in shell scripts and Makefiles. Environment variables are used as fall-back for undefined Ruby constants.
>> class <<Object
>> alias :old_const_missing :const_missing
>> def const_missing(sym)
>> ENV[sym.to_s] || old_const_missing(sym)
>> end
>> end
=> nil
>> puts SHELL
/bin/zsh
=> nil
>> TERM == 'xterm'
=> true
create an array of consecutive numbers:
x = [*0..5]
sets x to [0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
I'm late to the party, but:
You can easily take two equal-length arrays and turn them into a hash with one array supplying the keys and the other the values:
a = [:x, :y, :z]
b = [123, 456, 789]
Hash[a.zip(b)]
# => { :x => 123, :y => 456, :z => 789 }
(This works because Array#zip "zips" up the values from the two arrays:
a.zip(b) # => [[:x, 123], [:y, 456], [:z, 789]]
And Hash[] can take just such an array. I've seen people do this as well:
Hash[*a.zip(b).flatten] # unnecessary!
Which yields the same result, but the splat and flatten are wholly unnecessary--perhaps they weren't in the past?)
Use a Range object as an infinite lazy list:
Inf = 1.0 / 0
(1..Inf).take(5) #=> [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
More info here: http://banisterfiend.wordpress.com/2009/10/02/wtf-infinite-ranges-in-ruby/
Boolean operators on non boolean values.
&& and ||
Both return the value of the last expression evaluated.
Which is why the ||= will update the variable with the value returned expression on the right side if the variable is undefined. This is not explicitly documented, but common knowledge.
However the &&= isn't quite so widely known about.
string &&= string + "suffix"
is equivalent to
if string
string = string + "suffix"
end
It's very handy for destructive operations that should not proceed if the variable is undefined.
James A. Rosen's tip is cool ([*items].each), but I find that it destroys hashes:
irb(main):001:0> h = {:name => "Bob"}
=> {:name=>"Bob"}
irb(main):002:0> [*h]
=> [[:name, "Bob"]]
I prefer this way of handling the case when I accept a list of things to process but am lenient and allow the caller to supply one:
irb(main):003:0> h = {:name => "Bob"}
=> {:name=>"Bob"}
irb(main):004:0> [h].flatten
=> [{:name=>"Bob"}]
This can be combined with a method signature like so nicely:
def process(*entries)
[entries].flatten.each do |e|
# do something with e
end
end
The "ruby" binary (at least MRI's) supports a lot of the switches that made perl one-liners quite popular.
Significant ones:
puts at the end of each loop iterationSome examples:
# Print each line with its number:
ruby -ne 'print($., ": ", $_)' < /etc/irbrc
# Print each line reversed:
ruby -lne 'puts $_.reverse' < /etc/irbrc
# Print the second column from an input CSV (dumb - no balanced quote support etc):
ruby -F, -ane 'puts $F[1]' < /etc/irbrc
# Print lines that contain "eat"
ruby -ne 'puts $_ if /eat/i' < /etc/irbrc
# Same as above:
ruby -pe 'next unless /eat/i' < /etc/irbrc
# Pass-through (like cat, but with possible line-end munging):
ruby -p -e '' < /etc/irbrc
# Uppercase all input:
ruby -p -e '$_.upcase!' < /etc/irbrc
# Same as above, but actually write to the input file, and make a backup first with extension .bak - Notice that inplace edit REQUIRES input files, not an input STDIN:
ruby -i.bak -p -e '$_.upcase!' /etc/irbrc
Feel free to google "ruby one-liners" and "perl one-liners" for tons more usable and practical examples. It essentially allows you to use ruby as a fairly powerful replacement to awk and sed.
Auto-vivifying hashes in Ruby
def cnh # silly name "create nested hash"
Hash.new {|h,k| h[k] = Hash.new(&h.default_proc)}
end
my_hash = cnh
my_hash[1][2][3] = 4
my_hash # => { 1 => { 2 => { 3 =>4 } } }
This can just be damn handy.
Fixnum#to_s(base) can be really useful in some case. One such case is generating random (pseudo)unique tokens by converting random number to string using base of 36.
Token of length 8:
rand(36**8).to_s(36) => "fmhpjfao"
rand(36**8).to_s(36) => "gcer9ecu"
rand(36**8).to_s(36) => "krpm0h9r"
Token of length 6:
rand(36**6).to_s(36) => "bvhl8d"
rand(36**6).to_s(36) => "lb7tis"
rand(36**6).to_s(36) => "ibwgeh"
I just love the inline keyword rescue like this:
EDITED EXAMPLE:
@user #=> nil (but I did't know)
@user.name rescue "Unknown"
link_to( d.user.name, url_user( d.user.id, d.user.name)) rescue 'Account removed'
This avoid breaking my App and is way better than the feature released at Rails .try()
I'm a fan of:
%w{An Array of strings} #=> ["An", "Array", "of", "Strings"]
It's sort of funny how often that's useful.
Wow, no one mentioned the flip flop operator:
1.upto(100) do |i|
puts i if (i == 3)..(i == 15)
end
each_with_index method for any enumarable object ( array,hash,etc.) perhaps?
myarray = ["la", "li", "lu"]
myarray.each_with_index{|v,idx| puts "#{idx} -> #{v}"}
#result:
#0 -> la
#1 -> li
#2 -> lu
Maybe it's more well known than other answers but not that well known for all ruby programmers :)
Destructuring an Array
(a, b), c, d = [ [:a, :b ], :c, [:d1, :d2] ]
Where:
a #=> :a
b #=> :b
c #=> :c
d #=> [:d1, :d2]
Using this technique we can use simple assignment to get the exact values we want out of nested array of any depth.
Defining a method that accepts any number of parameters and just discards them all
def hello(*)
super
puts "hello!"
end
The above hello method only needs to puts "hello" on the screen and call super - but since the superclass hello defines parameters it has to as well - however since it doesn't actually need to use the parameters itself - it doesn't have to give them a name.