Can't get 'require' to work

Ruby
1

I just started tinkering with Ruby. From “The Poignant Ruby P.mer”
or whatever it’s called (you know what I mean) I tried running the small
example but get an error.
This is the first file called m2.rb:

require ‘/usr/home/me.rb’

Get evil idea and swap in code words

print "Enter your new idea: "
idea = gets
code_words.each do |real, code|
idea.gsub!( real, code )
end

Save the jibberish to a new file

print "File encoded. Please enter a name for this idea: "
idea_name = gets.strip
File::open( “idea-” + idea_name + “.txt”, “w” ) do |f|
f << idea
end

And this is me.rb:

code_words = {
‘starmonkeys’ => ‘Phil and Pete, those prickly chancellors of the New
Reich’,
‘catapult’ => ‘chucky go-go’, ‘firebomb’ => ‘Heat-Assisted Living’,
‘Nigeria’ => “Ny and Jerry’s Dry Cleaning (with Donuts)”,
‘Put the kabosh on’ => ‘Put the cable box on’
}

When I do: ruby me2.rb and enter any of the code_words above, I get:

me2.rb:6: undefined local variable or method `code_words’ for
main:Object (NameError)

What am I missing?

2

On Aug 8, 2007, at 7:57 PM, Howard Fine wrote:

print "Enter your new idea: "
end
}

When I do: ruby me2.rb and enter any of the code_words above, I get:

me2.rb:6: undefined local variable or method `code_words’ for
main:Object (NameError)

require is working fine. What you have is a scoping problem. The
following shows a couple of ways to fix it.

<code – me.rb>
$code_words = {
‘starmonkeys’ => ‘Phil and Pete, those prickly chancellors of the
NewReich’,
‘catapult’ => ‘chucky go-go’, ‘firebomb’ => ‘Heat-Assisted Living’,
‘Nigeria’ => “Ny and Jerry’s Dry Cleaning (with Donuts)”,
‘Put the kabosh on’ => ‘Put the cable box on’
}

CODE_WORDS = {
‘starmonkeys’ => ‘Phil and Pete, those prickly chancellors of the
NewReich’,
‘catapult’ => ‘chucky go-go’, ‘firebomb’ => ‘Heat-Assisted Living’,
‘Nigeria’ => “Ny and Jerry’s Dry Cleaning (with Donuts)”,
‘Put the kabosh on’ => ‘Put the cable box on’
}
</code?>

<code – me.rb>
require “/Users/mg/Desktop/me” # I put it in a different place, but
makes no difference

global variable

$code_words # => {“Nigeria”=>“Ny and Jerry’s Dry Cleaning (with
Donuts)”, “firebomb”=>“Heat-Assisted Living”, “catapult”=>“chucky go-
go”, “Put the kabosh on”=>“Put the cable box on”,
“starmonkeys”=>“Phil and Pete, those prickly chancellors of the
NewReich”}

constant – note leading ::

::CODE_WORDS # => {“Nigeria”=>“Ny and Jerry’s Dry Cleaning (with
Donuts)”, “firebomb”=>“Heat-Assisted Living”, “catapult”=>“chucky go-
go”, “Put the kabosh on”=>“Put the cable box on”,
“starmonkeys”=>“Phil and Pete, those prickly chancellors of the
NewReich”}
</code?>

Regards, Morton

3

None of that worked.
I think the Poignant Tutorial must have errors in it. I did change
code_words to $code_words in the main file. That makes sense to me
because it’s a global variable. But now I get the error " undefined
method `each’ for nil:NilClass (NoMethodError)"

I haven’t read anything more than that tutorial so I need to get a
better source. I do have one but liked this one for a quick and dirty
overview.

4

Howard Fine wrote:

None of that worked.
I think the Poignant Tutorial must have errors in it. I did change
code_words to $code_words in the main file. That makes sense to me
because it’s a global variable. But now I get the error " undefined
method `each’ for nil:NilClass (NoMethodError)"

I haven’t read anything more than that tutorial so I need to get a
better source. I do have one but liked this one for a quick and dirty
overview.

make sure you change it to $code_words in all instances :slight_smile:

5

Roger P. wrote:

Howard Fine wrote:

None of that worked.
I think the Poignant Tutorial must have errors in it. I did change
code_words to $code_words in the main file. That makes sense to me
because it’s a global variable. But now I get the error " undefined
method `each’ for nil:NilClass (NoMethodError)"

I haven’t read anything more than that tutorial so I need to get a
better source. I do have one but liked this one for a quick and dirty
overview.

make sure you change it to $code_words in all instances :slight_smile:

Well, there ya’ go. Thanks!