Ruth A. Kramer (rhkramer / fast.net) wrote:
> Florian Gross wrote:
> > I'd just say that Objects are in most cases represented by VALUEs. I'm
> > not sure what you mean with "encoded instance variables".
> 
> (Not "picking" on Florian in particular, just needed a convenient quote
> to respond to.) 
> 
> This thread confuses me, and I think it's at least partly by
> "overloaded" use of the word "value". ;-)
> 

Hi, Ruth.  So, when someone on the list uses uppercase VALUE, they are
refering to an object's symbol table id.  The symbol table being the
global dictionary that pairs up a unique id with pointers to the actual
objects.  VALUE is a C typedef.

Sometimes when I'm conversing with other languages, such as in my Syck
extension, I'll rename VALUE as SYMID, in the hopes of clearing things
up a bit.

So, yeah, it's a generic word, but it's also referring to the most
common and generic form of data used inside Ruby.

_why