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Bug #6723

closed

Global variable scoping problem.

Added by iblue (Markus Fenske) over 11 years ago. Updated over 11 years ago.

Status:
Closed
Target version:
ruby -v:
-
Backport:
[ruby-core:46335]

Description

This issue exists from 1.8 to ruby-head.

See the following example:

def foobar
"Foobar".match(/^(\w*)/)
puts $1.inspect
end

foobar
puts $1.inspect
puts global_variables.inspect

This demonstrates that $1 does not behave like a global variable. However it's listed by Kernel.global_variables as a global variable. And it's named like a global variable.

This leads to some confusion sometimes. See for example http://stackoverflow.com/q/11441782/773690

It may not be a good idea to fix this inconsistent naming, because it may break severaly things. However the fact that $1 and friends are not global variables should be clearly documented. And by the way: Ruby != Perl.

Or maybe make $1 a real global variable?

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