Hashed method args

Is there a reason Ruby can't work like this:

def do_something(first_arg, second_arg)
  puts "First: #{first_arg}"
  puts "Second: #{second_arg}"
end

do_something(:second_arg => 'blah', :first_arg => 'yeah') =>
First: yeah
Second: blah

...while still supporting this:

do_something('yeah', 'blah') =>
First: yeah
Second: blah

It sure seems like it would be the best of both worlds.

Instead you have to do this:

def do_something(params)
  puts "First: #{params[:first_arg]}"
  puts "Second: #{params[:second_arg]}"
end

...but that's stupid and terrible because then your method signature tells you nothing (NOTHING!) about what arguments you can give it. And that makes me sad.

And positional parameters are a major pain in the tukhus once you have more than three or so. Does the database_mode argument go here? Or is it the address hash? Yeah, fun times.

There's probably some reason it can't work the way I want it to.

Tags » nerd ruby

18 May 2011
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Hashed method args

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