I have a very basic question about Ruby which I can't seem to answer from browsing online:
property :currency, String
What does 'property' above mean? What circumstances should I use it under?
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1http://stackoverflow.com/questions/19055378/whats-the-nature-of-property-in-a-ruby-class – Bibek Sharma Nov 27 '15 at 08:25
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2http://www.rubydoc.info/github/datamapper/dm-core/DataMapper/Property – Bibek Sharma Nov 27 '15 at 08:26
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1It's not a general Ruby thing - it's provided by some library you're using. – sevenseacat Nov 27 '15 at 08:57
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Isn't it like `attr_accessor` but with type-safety? – Charles Nov 27 '15 at 23:44
2 Answers
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As for many case in Rails, this is (most probably) a carefully disguised method call. Remember that in Ruby, parenthesis around method calls are options, so:
add(3, 4)
add 3, 4
are equivalent. So in your case,
property :currency, String
can actually be written as:
property(:currency, String)
So, a call to a method called "property" which takes two arguments, a Symbol and a Class. The method is most probably defined on a class from a library you are using.
Martin
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thank for clarifying martin. It's indeed a method, but as defined by the second link provided by Bibek Sharma above. – RPV Nov 27 '15 at 09:29
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property :currency, String is a method call. When you find a line like that in a class then that means that a method property is called with :currency and String as parameter.
For the special mean of this method, look at the docs
spickermann
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