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I saw the following in a book.

def deleted_roles=(values)
roles.find(*values).each(&:destroy)
end

I understand that this method finds all the roles with the given ids and
calls destroy on all of them. My question is, what is the significance
of *. Why is it roles.find(*values) and not just plain
roles.find(values)?

Is there any difference?

Could it possibly be a typo and the method should be defined as

def deleted_roles(*values)...

Thanks
--
Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.

* expands an array as multiple arguments. For example, type in an irb session:

def find(*args) # This * is not the same * as yours, this is just used
to collect all the arguments in a single array
args.each {|x| puts x.class}
end

find [1,2,3] => Array
find *[1,2,3] => Fixnum three times.

Regards,

Serabe

--
http://www.serabe.com

[Note: parts of this message were removed to make it a legal post.]

Hi,

> def deleted_roles=(values)
> roles.find(*values).each(&:destroy)
> end
>
> I understand that this method finds all the roles with the given ids
> and
> calls destroy on all of them. My question is, what is the significance
> of *. Why is it roles.find(*values) and not just plain
> roles.find(values)?
>
> Is there any difference?
>
> Could it possibly be a typo and the method should be defined as
>
> def deleted_roles(*values)...

It looks like roles.find expects a list of parameters (i.e. it should
be invoked like this: roles.find('admin', 'user', 'editor'))
but deleted_roles= wants an array (i.e. deleted_rows = ['admin',
'user', 'editor'])

The * a.k.a. splat does exactly this conversion - so if someone calls

deleted_rows = ['admin', 'user', 'editor']

inside the method

roles.find('admin', 'user', 'editor').each(&:destroy)

will be called (note that the brackets are gone)


HTH,
Peter
___
http://www.rubyrailways.com