"Filing out" irb prototyping sessions?

ruby-talk
1

Hi folks,

It looks like you can use irb as a rapid prototyping environment by
combining ability to bind to objects and modify them, utilize tab
completion, and of course interact/prototype with these objects you are
manipulating.

Suppose you prototype some things and would like to "file out" your
changes to Ruby code so that you could easily reference your ideas.

Is there some way to easily file out object definitions from an irb
session?

2

There is an excellent collection of history methods for IRb at:

http://blog.bleything.net/articles/2006/10/21/shell-style-history-for-irb

Unfortunately, that link seems to be down right now. The following code is my .irbrc file, which includes the methods. (It uses the wirble gem.)

James Edward Gray II

# load libraries
require 'rubygems'
require 'wirble'

# start wirble (with color)
Wirble.init
Wirble.colorize

# history additions from http://blog.bleything.net/
def history(how_many = 50)
   history_size = Readline::HISTORY.size

   # no lines, get out of here
   puts "No history" and return if history_size == 0

   start_index = 0

   # not enough lines, only show what we have
   if history_size <= how_many
     how_many = history_size - 1
     end_index = how_many
   else
     end_index = history_size - 1 # -1 to adjust for array offset
     start_index = end_index - how_many
   end

   start_index.upto(end_index) {|i| print_line i}
   nil
end
alias :h :history

# -2 because -1 is ourself
def history_do(lines = (Readline::HISTORY.size - 2))
   irb_eval lines
   nil
end
alias :h! :history_do

def history_write(filename, lines)
   file = File.open(filename, 'w')

   get_lines(lines).each do |l|
     file << "#{l}\n"
   end

   file.close
end
alias :hw :history_write

private
def get_line(line_number)
   Readline::HISTORY[line_number]
end

def get_lines(lines = )
   return [get_line(lines)] if lines.is_a? Fixnum

   out =

   lines = lines.to_a if lines.is_a? Range

   lines.each do |l|
     out << Readline::HISTORY[l]
   end

   return out
end

def print_line(line_number, show_line_numbers = true)
   print "[%04d] " % line_number if show_line_numbers
   puts get_line(line_number)
end

def irb_eval(lines)
   to_eval = get_lines(lines)

   eval to_eval.join("\n")

   to_eval.each {|l| Readline::HISTORY << l}
end

···

On Dec 5, 2006, at 2:15 PM, Griff wrote:

Is there some way to easily file out object definitions from an irb
session?

3

Courtesy Ryan Davis:

first: gem install ruby2ruby

require 'rubygems'
require 'discover'
require 'ruby2ruby'
$old_classes = discover_classes
def saveirb
   (discover_classes - $old_classes).each do |klass|
     puts RubyToRuby.translate(klass)
   end
end

···

On Dec 5, 2006, at 12:15 , Griff wrote:

Hi folks,

It looks like you can use irb as a rapid prototyping environment by
combining ability to bind to objects and modify them, utilize tab
completion, and of course interact/prototype with these objects you are
manipulating.

Suppose you prototype some things and would like to "file out" your
changes to Ruby code so that you could easily reference your ideas.

Is there some way to easily file out object definitions from an irb
session?

--
Eric Hodel - drbrain@segment7.net - http://blog.segment7.net

I LIT YOUR GEM ON FIRE!