On Mar 22, 2006, at 7:57 PM, Matt R. wrote:

> I'm getting some strange behavior with YAML in ruby regarding the
> characters '08' in a hash.
>
> This code:
> #
> require 'yaml'
> test = { "08" => '01', '01' => '08', '8' => '01'
> }
> File.open("test.yml", "w") {|f| YAML.dump(test, f)}
> #
>
> produces this file:
> ---
> "01": 08
> "8": "01"
> 08: "01"
>
> I do not understand why the 08s are not quoted. I tried it under ruby
> 1.8.2 and 1.8.4.
>
> Is this expected?
>
> thanks,
> -Matt
>
> --  
> Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.
>

Well just guessing here, but you  don't have to quote 08 because it  
couldn't be an octal number anyway, so it must be a string. I don't  
know if this is why this happens or if this is what the YAML spec  
says but it makes sense to me, sorta.