On 2006-11-17 18:11:10 +0100, Paul Lutus <nospam / nosite.zzz> said:

> Josselin wrote:
> 
>> After reading completely my Ruby book, I cannot find a function
>> equivalent to the PHP  is_numeric? to test a String
>> 
>> myString.is_numeric?   (check only digits and dot character)   =>
>> return true or false
>> 
>> does it exist ? or it's more complicated than that ? (need to build a
>> regex... ?)
> 
> ------------------------------------
> #!/usr/bin/ruby -w
> 
> def is_numeric?(s)
>   return (s.to_s =~ /^\d+(\.\d+|\d*)$/)?true:false
> end
> 
> puts is_numeric?(1.2345)
> puts is_numeric?(12345678987654321)
> puts is_numeric?(0)
> puts is_numeric?(0.0)
> puts is_numeric?(".001")
> puts is_numeric?(123435.12345)
> puts is_numeric?("123435.")
> ------------------------------------
> 
> Output:
> 
> true
> true
> true
> true
> false
> true
> false
> 
> An extension to this function would handle float exponents and associated
> characters.

thanks Paul... I see why there is no such function (I am translating 
PHP -> Ruby) , too many cases
better using a regexp....