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Is there a way in Ruby to take a symbol or string and turn it into a class of the same name?
For instance, if I have a class such as
class Bob def talk puts "Hi, I'm bob" end end And a method I have somewhere else in the code is passed a symbol :bob, can I in some way turn that into the class Bob? Maybe something like
b = :Bob.new b.talk Or is there a way to do something similar to this?
822
Ruby symbols are defined as “scalar value objects used as identifiers, mapping immutable strings to fixed internal values.” Essentially what this means is that symbols are immutable strings. In programming, an immutable object is something that cannot be changed.
Ruby symbols are created by placing a colon (:) before a word. You can think of it as an immutable string. A symbol is an instance of Symbol class, and for any given name of symbol there is only one Symbol object.
The :: is a unary operator and is used to access (anywhere outside the class or module) constants, instance methods and class methods defined within a class or module. Note: In Ruby, classes and methods may be considered constants too.
What is a class in Ruby? Classes are the basic building blocks in Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) & they help you define a blueprint for creating objects. Objects are the products of the class.
There are many ways to do this. Your lack of context makes it impossible to elect a "best" way. Here's a few ayways.
Kernel.const_get(:Bob) eval(:Bob.to_s) Kernel.const_get(:bob.to_s.capitalize) If you love us? You can donate to us via Paypal or buy me a coffee so we can maintain and grow! Thank you!
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