On 12/5/05, petermichaux / yahoo.com <petermichaux / yahoo.com> wrote:
> I'm still trying to grasp exactly what symbols are. I am getting a
> feeling that they are related to my old friends the C pointers. Am I
> getting closer?

Not at all. The truth can hardly be further from your understanding.
Symbols are nothing but static strings. They have the advantage that
unlike normal strings, for any given interned symbol you have only one
particular instance stored in the interpreter, so provided you don't
have too many of them, they can save you a ton of memory. They also
look better and are a lot easier to type than actual Strings, and
they're generally appropriate for use where you'd usually make use of
a defined constant.