ruby/smalltalk: method_missing/doesNotUnderstand

[Giles Bowkett]

Hi all - this is for the Smalltalkers and the people interested in
Ruby's genealogy, as it were. Is it fair for me to tell people that
method_missing is a Ruby translation of Smalltalk's doesNotUnderstand?
Or is it more a totally unique feature? I was going to say the first,
but now I think it's the latter. I don't think you can rewrite
doesNotUnderstand the way you can rewrite method_missing - or,
actually, I think you **can**, but I think in practice it happens much
less. Anyway, help me out if you know the answer to this one.

 

[Rick DeNatale]

Hi all - this is for the Smalltalkers and the people interested in
Ruby's genealogy, as it were. Is it fair for me to tell people that
method_missing is a Ruby translation of Smalltalk's doesNotUnderstand?
Or is it more a totally unique feature? I was going to say the first,
but now I think it's the latter. I don't think you can rewrite
doesNotUnderstand the way you can rewrite method_missing - or,
actually, I think you **can**, but I think in practice it happens much
less. Anyway, help me out if you know the answer to this one.

Actually overriding doeNotUnderstand: in Smalltalk is rather common
for much the same reasons it's used in Ruby.

For example, when I wrote the Smalltalk distributed feature for IBM
Smalltalk about 10 years ago, doesNotUnderstand was a key underpinning
of the implementation.

As to where Matz got the idea you'd have to ask him, but it's very
much the same mechanism.

 

[Giles Bowkett]

Actually overriding doeNotUnderstand: in Smalltalk is rather common

for much the same reasons it's used in Ruby.

For example, when I wrote the Smalltalk distributed feature for IBM
Smalltalk about 10 years ago, doesNotUnderstand was a key underpinning
of the implementation.

As to where Matz got the idea you'd have to ask him, but it's very
much the same mechanism.

Gracias! That's kind of what I suspected.

 

[Ryan Davis]

Actually overriding doeNotUnderstand: in Smalltalk is rather common
for much the same reasons it's used in Ruby.

For example, when I wrote the Smalltalk distributed feature for IBM
Smalltalk about 10 years ago, doesNotUnderstand was a key underpinning
of the implementation.

seconded.