How to overwrite the system function

Question

I'ld like to overwrite the system() function. Is that possible?

You could "monkeypatch" it, symply by defining it, as commentor 23tux explains. But you [really don't want to overwrite the system(). Really not](http://stackoverflow.com/a/4471202/73673). — berkes, Jan 15 '13 at 14:32
This is a bad thing to do. That you ask if you can shows you probably don't know why you shouldn't. — the Tin Man, Jan 15 '13 at 14:32

score 3 · Accepted Answer · edited Jan 15 '13 at 14:36

3

Sure, you can overwrite nearly everything in Ruby (whether useful or not):

system "ls /" # returns "/etc /var...", normal behaviour

def system args
  puts args
end

system "ls /" # returns "ls /"

edited Jan 15 '13 at 14:36

the Tin Man

answered Jan 15 '13 at 14:31

23tux

I don't know your project, but if you want to use it global: Before you are calling system the first time ;) In an initializer for example, or in your startscript or whatever – 23tux Jan 15 '13 at 14:58

score -1 · Answer 2 · answered Jan 15 '13 at 14:33

-1

If it doesn't matter to use system at all then you can use backticks. The backticks execute the command and return the output as a string.

You can then assign the value to a variable like so:

output = `ls`
p output

answered Jan 15 '13 at 14:33

sjain

2 Answers2