A Symbol
object represents a Ruby name and is generated automatically using the :name
literal syntax. The same Symbol
object will be created for a given name string for the duration of a program's execution, regardless of the context or meaning of that name. Thus if Fred
is a constant in one context, a method in another, and a class in a third, the Symbol
:Fred
will be the same object in all three contexts.
module One
class Fred
end
$f1 = :Fred
end
module Two
Fred = 1
$f2 = :Fred
end
def Fred()
end
$f3 = :Fred
$f1.id → 2305294
$f2.id → 2305294
$f3.id → 2305294
:fred.id2name → "fred"
:fred.inspect → ":fred"
Symbol#id2name
.Extracted from the book "Programming Ruby - The Pragmatic Programmer's Guide"
Copyright © 2001 by Addison Wesley Longman, Inc. This material may be distributed only subject to the terms and conditions set forth in the Open Publication License, v1.0 or later (the latest version is presently available at http://www.opencontent.org/openpub/).
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