Hello dblack, Tuesday, November 26, 2002, 3:25:34 AM, you wrote: dcsn> (1) ++ and -- are NOT reserved operator in Ruby. dcsn> (2) C's increment/decrement operators are in fact hidden assignment. dcsn> They affect variables, not objects. You cannot accomplish dcsn> assignment via method. Ruby uses +=/-= operator instead. dcsn> (3) self cannot be a target of assignment. In addition, altering dcsn> the value of integer 1 might cause severe confusion throughout dcsn> the program. the same applied to '<<'? :) -- Best regards, Bulat mailto:bulatz / integ.ru