Namespace collision with top-level methods

Question

I have the following Ruby namespace problem:

I have a number of top-level methods in a "library", among these I have a get_name(param) method. The problem is that I want to use this get_name(param) method inside a class that has its own get_name() method (without param!). Of course this results in a problem as the 2 methods are different and the new one in the class overrides the top-level one.

Is there a way to do something like this:

def get_name(param)
  puts param
end

class Foo 
  def get_name()
    puts "name"
  end
  def bar()
    self.get_name() #should work and print name, i.e. it uses the get_name method of Foo
    get_name("abc") #should work and print abc, i.e. it uses the top-level method
  end
end

I would like to know if there is an easy way to achieve this without having to alter the name or scope of the top-level methods. (The goal is to have those available without modification as global methods, but still be able to call instance methods of Foo without errors.

Answer 1

If the library methods are really top-level methods and are not part of any class or module, then, they will get defined as private methods of Object class.

You can do following to invoke it:

  def bar()
    self.get_name()
    Object.send(:get_name, "abc")  # Will print "abc" to console
  end