Hi -- On Mon, 20 Jul 2009, 7stud -- wrote: > David A. Black wrote: >> Hi -- >> >> On Mon, 20 Jul 2009, 7stud -- wrote: >> >>> David A. Black wrote: >>>> I'm not sure what that buys you, though. >>> >>> Simplicity of comprehension over brevity. >> >> I guess I like the ||= idiom because it has both. > > For you, yes. But apparently not for the op: > >>> I was trying to figure out how to use a hash but did not >>> make the leap to the ||= construction on my own. I wouldn't recommend freezing one's knowledge or leap abilities at a particular point, though :-) I'm certainly in sympathy with being suspicious of punctuation-heavy stuff, but in the case of ||= it's such a common idiom, and so easy to learn, that it seems like a bit of an artificial hardship not to learn it. Still, if will work too :-) >> The ||= idiom should work >> fine > > ..until it doesn't (I think you know what I'm refering to). The hash default thing? I don't think that comes into play here, does it? David -- David A. Black / Ruby Power and Light, LLC Ruby/Rails consulting & training: http://www.rubypal.com Now available: The Well-Grounded Rubyist (http://manning.com/black2) Training! Intro to Ruby, with Black & Kastner, September 14-17 (More info: http://rubyurl.com/vmzN)