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Ruby

Posted by Colton Colcleasure
Colton Colcleasure
3,062 Points

Ruby Methods: Are they basically just Ruby's functions?

Pretty straight forward question. I'm doing into Ruby courses and it's teaching me methods. They seem like Python and PHP's functions. Are Ruby methods essentially just functions? Or will I learn Ruby functions later and be able to distinguish them from one another?

1 Answer

James Gill
James Gill
Courses Plus Student 34,936 Points

In Ruby, there are not the dual concepts of "function" and "method"--Ruby only has "methods". The reason, if I understand correctly, is that everything in Ruby is an object--so all those function-like things you see are object methods.

In PHP and Python, there are both functions and methods. In both of those languages, the things called "functions" normally reside outside of classes/objects; when inside a class/object, they're called "methods", and have different rules for how they're used.

Make sense?

Colton Colcleasure
Colton Colcleasure
3,062 Points

It clears up the function/method thing, but it leaves me in the dark due to my lack of understanding of OOP. I get the whole "everything is an object" sales pitch, but I don't understand what that means yet.

But, you've answered my question completely, so I thank you.