Ruby object literals (ala javascript)

Question

In ruby you can go

a = { }
a['a'] = 82
a['b'] = 'foo'
puts a['a'] # 82

I wish I could use dot notation, like javascript.

puts a.a # 82

Is there a way to build object literals and access them with dot notation in ruby?

Answer 1

You can create a Struct.

A = Struct.new(:a, :b)
a = A.new(82, 'foo')
puts a.a
#=> 82

edit:

you can even do

a = { }
a['a'] = 82
a['b'] = 'foo'
Struct.new(*a.keys).new(*a.values)

Answer 2

The structure what you need is a OpenStruct which work the same way as JS object literals. It has overwritten method_missing method which allow adding new variables using setter methods.