Why Ruby?

[Andrei Alexandrescu]

On 12/15/10 4:18 PM, retard wrote:
> Wed, 15 Dec 2010 22:23:35 +0100, Jacob Carlborg wrote:
>> Array(1, 2, 3, 4, 5).sortWith(_>  _)
>
> The first instance of _ (from left to right) is replaced with the first
> element of the parameter tuple, the second with second element, etc.
>
> This is actually very useful since many lambdas only use 1-2 parameters.
> It has its limitations. For example referring to the same parameter
> requires a named parameter or some other hack. Combined with Haskell
> style partial application this allows stuff like:
>
> Array(1, 2, 3, 4, 5).foreach { println }
>
> Array(1, 2, 3, 4, 5).filter(2<)

For short lambdas I prefer Phobos' convention of using "a" and "b", e.g. 
"2 < a" or "a < b". Since it's a string, "_ < _" would have been usable 
with Phobos too but I wouldn't like such a change.

Andrei