Nikolai Weibull
11/18/2004 2:26:00 PM
* trans. (T. Onoma) <transami@runbox.com> [Nov 18, 2004 14:10]:
> > Lately there have been a bunch of posts on this list about regular
> > expressions in Ruby and people seem to cry wolf whenever they don't
> > get them quite right. By crying wolf here I mean that they suspect
> > a bug. That's most often the same as blaming core-dumps on the
> > operating system. It's time that people try to reason about what
> > they've actually written and look at the documentation (which may be
> > too limited?) before complaining here.
> This is terrible.
Thanks.
> Not only is it unfair to disenfranchise newbies who, for obvious
> reasons, would struggle with regular expressions,
The problem I was aiming to remedy.
> but the whole premise if false. (ASFICT) I am responsible for most if
> not all the latest R.E. posts. And I do not recall once suspecting a
> bug.
> I have asked about extending features (such as Regexp.arity) and
> whether certain existing features might not be more useful if they
> worked differently (like #scan). Never did I cry wolf.
ASFICT == AFAICT?
I did not accuse any specific entity of misdoings, nor did I consider
your posts; which are rather old by now. I do not consider a post
discussing the arity of regular expressions equivalent with one that
asks if it is a bug that /[...a-b]/ doesn't match '-'. The first one is
a rather esoteric question, which certainly proved that you weren't a
newbie; the second is rather more newbyish as it shows unfamiliarity
with one of the most basic regular expressions shorthands. My intention
wasn't to dismiss the question as such, but wondering if it was a bug
certainly shows that the person in question hadn't read up on regular
expressions before trying to use them.
The question then is whether the person was just being lazy or hadn't
found proper documentation. My suspicion is that we are dealing with
the second case - which implies that we need better documentation, which
was my original intent and suggestion. If it was the first, then I
don't really have to say much more.
> (For a taste of your own medicine) Perhaps it's time for you to try to
> read more carefully.
And you aswell.
Listen, my intent wasn't to place blame nor accuse any individual of any
wrongdoings. I just wanted to point out that we'd been having a lot of
the same kind of discussions and that they seemed to suggest a very poor
understanding of regular expressions and their use among the Ruby-Newby
populace.
Apparently I managed to press quite a few buttons with my post and if
anyone was offended I apologize. I, however, still think my thesis and
conclusion are valid.
My reasoning was that people either weren't looking at the documentation
or that the documentation was too limited in nature. Robert Klemme
suggested that there was a lot of documentation available (I agree). If
this is true, then why are people still asking very basic questions?
Either they are too lazy to look up the documentation, or they can't
find any. Both are a result of there not being a good resource of
introductory (nor advanced for that matter) material about using regular
expressions, especially for Ruby.
I suggested that this situation be remedied, but that I couldn't do it
myself. The general attitude so far seems to be that I should shut the
fuck up and write it myself if I think this is such a big deal...
nikolai
--
::: name: Nikolai Weibull :: aliases: pcp / lone-star / aka :::
::: born: Chicago, IL USA :: loc atm: Gothenburg, Sweden :::
::: page: www.pcppopper.org :: fun atm: gf,lps,ruby,lisp,war3 :::
main(){printf(&linux["\021%six\012\0"],(linux)["have"]+"fun"-97);}