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Ruby

Posted by frontend
frontend
15,619 Points

ruby question on 'end'

in the following statement...

numbers = []
number = 0

loop do
    if numbers.count >= 3
        break
    end
numbers.push(number)
number += 1
end

why do you need to 'end' . why can't you just use one end at the end of the scope? i am confused...please help.

frontend
frontend
15,619 Points

Thanks Jason. It seems mind boggling how many languages & frameworks are out there which seemingly all accomplish the same thing. Wouldn't it be beautiful if there was one language that accomplished everything? It almost seems like they make it confusing on purpose. One day there will be a programming language that is way more efficient and readable than the ones we know today.

1 Answer

Jon Dalberg
Jon Dalberg
6,788 Points
Jon Dalberg
Jon Dalberg
6,788 Points

The "if" statement needs to know where it stops and that is determined by the "end" keyword. You could have written it to be in one line like this:

break if numbers.count >= 3

That would avoid having another "end" keyword. Some prefer this way when the action to execute is small (like just a "break" statement in your example).

frontend
frontend
15,619 Points

Thanks Jon....the syntax is still a bit fuzzy since I initially learned javascript. it seems a bit inefficient to have two ends there whether or not i put the break on one line. the break statement determined when the loop stops, not the if statement. that is why it is confusing to put multiple ends in one function.

Jason Anello
Jason Anello
Courses Plus Student 94,610 Points

This isn't all that different from what you would have in javascript.

There would be an opening and closing curly brace for the if block and opening and closing curly braces for the loop.

The 2 closing curly braces in js } would be equivalent to the 2 end statements in the ruby code.

I assume your question is asking about why the first end is necessary.

As Jon already mentioned, you have to know where it ends. Without it, does the numbers.push line belong to the if or the loop? There's no way to know.

Python eliminates the need for both curly braces and end statements but it still has to deal with this problem of where blocks end. Python handles it with indentation.

In all 3 languages, you have to know where the if ends, but they each handle it with different syntax.