Classes in ruby

Question

Recently started learning ruby and I've created a class for family members that contains name, age, sex, marital status, and traits. I am trying to write a method that will determine if a family member is a parent and if whether or not its the mother or the father.

so the code for the method is as follows:

def is_father?(age, sex)
    if age > 30
      puts "is parent"
          if sex == "Male"
            then puts "is father"
          else puts "not father"
          end
    end
  end

And a family member might look like this:

fm1=Family.new("John", "Male", 54, "Married", "Annoying")

after being initialized like this:

class Family
  def initialize(name, sex, age, status, trait)
    @fam_name=name
    @fam_sex=sex
    @fam_age=age
    @fam_stat=status
    @fam_trait=trait
  end
end

If a person contains the previously mentioned characteristics, how do I just pass age + sex into this method? Thanks in advance for your help

@steenslag i'd like to notify you that, even 15 years later, your attempt at humor has not gone to waste - i chuckled. — nicholaswmin
– nicholaswmin, Commented Dec 25, 2024 at 11:55

knut · Accepted Answer · 2012-10-02 21:06:14Z

You must store your data during initialization in attributes. later you can use them without using parameters of the method.

Example:

class Family
   def initialize(name, sex, age, status, trait)
    @fam_name=name
    @fam_sex=sex
    @fam_age=age
    @fam_stat=status
    @fam_trait=trait
  end
  def is_parent?; @fam_age > 30;end
  def is_father?
    is_parent? and @fam_sex == "Male"
  end
  def to_s
    result = @fam_name.dup
    if @fam_age > 30
      result <<  " is parent and is "
          if @fam_sex == "Male"
            result << "father"
          else 
            result << "not father"
          end
      end
    result
  end
end

fm1=Family.new("John", "Male", 54, "Married", "Annoying")
puts fm1.ilding is_parent?
puts fm1.is_father?
puts fm1

Remarks:

I modified your is_father? - methods ending on ? normally returns a boolean value.
I moved your text building to method to_s. to_s is called if you print your object with puts.
Better you avoid puts inside your methods. Most of the times, it is better to return an answer string and make the puts when you call the method.

Perhaps I misunderstand your request.

If is_father? is no method of Family and you need access to the attributes, then you must define a getter method:

class Family
  def initialize(name, sex, age, status, trait)
    @fam_name=name
    @fam_sex=sex
    @fam_age=age
    @fam_stat=status
    @fam_trait=trait
  end
  attr_reader :fam_sex
  attr_reader :fam_age
end

fm1=Family.new("John", "Male", 54, "Married", "Annoying")
puts fm1.fam_sex
puts fm1.fam_age


is_father?(fm1.fam_age, fm1.fam_sex)

Thanks so much for your help, I'll have it working soon enough!

user904990 · Accepted Answer · 2012-10-02 21:08:17Z

0

Once you initialized age/sex/etc you can use them in any method by @age/@sex/@etc

def is_father?(age = nil, sex = nil)
    if (age || @age) > 30
        puts "is parent"
    end
    if (sex || @sex) == "Male"
        puts "is father"
    else 
        puts "not father"
    end
end

In example above if you pass values to the method, they will be used instead ones set at initialization

answered Oct 2, 2012 at 21:08

user904990

Comments

megas · Accepted Answer · 2012-10-02 21:20:26Z

0

Using Struct can save a banch of code

class Family < Struct.new(:name, :sex, :age, :status, :trait)
  # define methods in usual manner
end

f = Family.new("John", 'male') #<struct Family name="John", sex="male", age=nil, status=nil, trait=nil>

answered Oct 2, 2012 at 21:20

megas

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