Subclassing Class

Ruby
21

On Dec 6, 2005, at 11:19 AM, David A. Black wrote:

the terminology free-for-all.
I do see your point. Keep the wordsmithing to the threads that are
about wordsmithing and use the “default” terminology in the day-to-day
threads. Does that sound about right? Eigenlivewithat :slight_smile:

Gary W.

22

On Dec 6, 2005, at 10:11 AM, David A. Black wrote:

That may be due to restraint on the part of people who prefer other
terms
than “eigenclass” but don’t think there should be a
“vote”-by-pre-emptive-usage contest in this area.

Isn’t that pretty much how all new jargon comes into being, by being
used?
Even in academic papers you’ll see words and phrases coined without a
vote
and if the semantics appeal to the community they will be referenced and
reused in another paper until they become part of the standard
nomenclature.

I do understand that new terms can be confusing and, unlike a
refereed paper,
most posters don’t have footnotes to define all their terms, but new
terms
will continue to emerge (e.g., Ajax) spontaneously.

The Ruby community is very fortunate to have Matz to sift through all
the
suggestions, RCRs, code, and discussion and provide a certain amount of
guidance, but that doesn’t preclude other sources of inspiration (I
hope).

The big elephant in the room seems to be Matz comments that the
semantics
of a meta/singleton/eigen class might be implemented via some mechanism
other than a class, which would certainly stir the pot a bit.

23

Hi David,

I just wanted to chime in that I totally agree with your position
regarding “singleton class” vs. other names for this concept.

“Ruby for Rails”, forthcoming from Manning Publications, April 2006!

The draft I read really rocks. I’m looking forward to the final book!

Wayne

Wayne V.
No Bugs Software
“Ruby and C++ Agile Contract Programming in Silicon Valley”

24

On Dec 6, 2005, at 1:43 PM, David A. Black wrote:

either :slight_smile:
For the record, that next sentence was:
But, granting that single authorship is not really the whole story
here,

Yeah, I should have acknowledged that in my response, but I didn’t
catch it
until after responding. I still would have responded, but perhaps more
obliquely.

I think I missed ‘part2’ in first reading because of such a direct,
unambiguous statement just before it. I just don’t know what to make of:
“Ruby is a work by Matz, not any of us” in the midst of a discussion of
language semantics. That sounded too much like “proof by authority” for
my liking nor is that what I see going on in the Ruby community.

Now we are getting off topic. Sorry for confusing your meaning.

25

Hi –

On Wed, 7 Dec 2005 [email protected] wrote:

obliquely.

I think I missed ‘part2’ in first reading because of such a direct,
unambiguous statement just before it. I just don’t know what to make of:
“Ruby is a work by Matz, not any of us” in the midst of a discussion of
language semantics. That sounded too much like “proof by authority” for
my liking nor is that what I see going on in the Ruby community.

Matz is, by his account, a “benevolent dictator” :slight_smile: It’s a great
community, but in terms of the technical side of Ruby (as opposed to
what
someone may want to do with a website design, or something) it’s not a
democracy.

It works out very well, though.

David
__
David A. Black
[email protected]

“Ruby for Rails”, forthcoming from Manning Publications, April 2006!

26

Hi –

On Wed, 7 Dec 2005 [email protected] wrote:

On Dec 6, 2005, at 11:19 AM, David A. Black wrote:

This is different. First of all, Ruby is a work by Matz, not any
of us.

With all due respect to Matz, I think Ruby is now much more than the
work of a single person. Without a doubt, the community continues to
benefit from his leadership and there is no reason to think that that
won’t continue but let’s not pass over all the other contributors.

Let’s not pass over the sentence right after the one you quoted either
:slight_smile:

David
__
David A. Black
[email protected]

“Ruby for Rails”, forthcoming from Manning Publications, April 2006!

27

I think I missed ‘part2’ in first reading because of such a direct,
unambiguous statement just before it. I just don’t know what to make of:
“Ruby is a work by Matz, not any of us” in the midst of a discussion of
language semantics. That sounded too much like “proof by authority” for
my liking nor is that what I see going on in the Ruby community.

Just to clarify that sentence you didn’t understand: it was in response
to
your point about academic works and their authors coming up with new
terms. My point was that if there’s an analogy there, it’s between the
academic authors and Matz, not between an author and every single person
who uses Ruby. (And that’s the point at which I tempered it by saying
the
analogy isn’t exact, etc… :slight_smile:

David
__
David A. Black
[email protected]

“Ruby for Rails”, forthcoming from Manning Publications, April 2006!