What's up with symbols?

ruby-talk
1

Hello fellows!

I'm trying to understand symbols. Not what they are, but rather why Ruby
has them. They are neat and I use them, but effectively you end up with
the same thing using plain strings, right? So why extend the language? I
get the feeling I'm missing a big point so please help me out by
pointing it out to me.

Best regards

Hans-Eric Grönlund

···

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Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.

2

Hi,

See:

* [Symbols Are Not Immutable Strings][1]
* [Many previous discussions on the list][2]

[1]: http://onestepback.org/index.cgi/+Tech/Ruby/SymbolsAreNotImmutableStrings.red
[2]: http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.ruby/search?group=comp.lang.ruby&q=symbols&qt_g=1&searchnow=Search+this+group

-- Daniel

···

On Apr 3, 2006, at 3:06 PM, Hans-Eric Grönlund wrote:

I'm trying to understand symbols. Not what they are, but rather why Ruby
has them. They are neat and I use them, but effectively you end up with
the same thing using plain strings, right? So why extend the language? I
get the feeling I'm missing a big point so please help me out by
pointing it out to me.

3

Hans-Eric Grönlund wrote:

Hello fellows!

I'm trying to understand symbols. Not what they are, but rather why Ruby has them. They are neat and I use them, but effectively you end up with the same thing using plain strings, right?

No. There was a lengthy thread about Symbols here on ruby-talk not too long ago, so perhaps you'll want to search the archives.

So why extend the language? I get the feeling I'm missing a big point so please help me out by pointing it out to me.

See also

···

--
James Britt

"A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming is not worth knowing."
   - A. Perlis

4

Daniel Harple wrote:

···

On Apr 3, 2006, at 3:06 PM, Hans-Eric Grönlund wrote:

I'm trying to understand symbols. Not what they are, but rather why Ruby
has them. They are neat and I use them, but effectively you end up with
the same thing using plain strings, right? So why extend the language? I
get the feeling I'm missing a big point so please help me out by
pointing it out to me.

Hi,

See:

* [Symbols Are Not Immutable Strings][1]
* [Many previous discussions on the list][2]

[1]: http://onestepback.org/index.cgi/+Tech/Ruby/ SymbolsAreNotImmutableStrings.red
[2]: http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.ruby/search? group=comp.lang.ruby&q=symbols&qt_g=1&searchnow=Search+this+group

-- Daniel

Is there somewhere besides the newsgroup for this?