This post is part of a series
Shortly into Part 1 of the rails install fest series, you'll come across Ruby symbols. Symbols are those things prefixed by a colon, such as :posts, :title and :body, which we come across in our database migration in part 1.
This post very briefly explains symbols, from a practical perspective. In doing so, it glosses over some issues, so at the end, I provide some links for those who want the full story.
For reference, here's the migration code from Part 1, which makes use of symbols.
class CreatePosts < ActiveRecord::Migration
def change
create_table :posts do |t|
t.string :title
t.text :body
t.timestamps
end
end
end
Symbols are "immutable strings". That is, they're strings that can't be changed.
In order to get an initial grasp Ruby code involving symbols, just mentally substitute the symbol for a string. A Ruby symbol is NOT a string. However, the symbol :posts in Ruby would, in most cases, behave in a similar way to it's equivalent string, 'posts', in other languages such as PHP, Java, etc.
Two main reasons:
1) Symbols, being more simple than strings, take up less memory and perform better.
2) There are situations where you want an unchanging string. Think of, for example, a database field name, or a hash key (or an array key in PHP). They're pretty much like constants. You wouldn't bother creating a constant variable for referring to them, but you would always refer to them using the exact same string.
Let's compare a PHP array to a Ruby hash:
// php array
<?php
$user = array( 'first_name' => 'Joshua' );
echo $user['first_name']; // outputs 'Joshua'
# ruby hash
user = { :first_name => 'Joshua' }
puts user[:first_name] # outputs 'Joshua'
You may want to manipulate the value, ie, 'Joshua', but the key, 'first_name', never needs to change. You're only using it to access that exact key of the array/hash. It's just an identifier, and you don't care about it in it's own right. You never need to capitalise it, concatentate it, get it's length, etc.
It's a string that shouldn't be changed, so in Ruby, you make it a string that can't be changed - ie, a symbol.
The topic of symbols has been covered in far more depth, by Rubyists far more knowledgable than myself. And though I've painted a picture of symbols as being almost exactly like strings, they're actually different under the hood, so to speak. Take a look at these resources:
The Difference Between Ruby Symbols and Strings
The Ruby_Newbie Guide to Symbols
"What is a symbol in Ruby?" question on programmers.stackexchange.com
Ruby-doc official Symbol page - this is probably less useful that the links above.