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I am doing a series of tutorials on how to code in Ruby. I want to read a .txt file using this formula:

filename = ARGV.first

prompt = "> "
txt = File.open(filename)

puts "Here's your file: #{filename}"
puts txt.read()

puts "I'll also ask you to type it again:"
print prompt
file_again = STDIN.gets.chomp()

txt_again = File.open(file_again)

puts txt_again.read()

The text file reads:

This is stuff I typed into a file. It is really cool stuff.
Lots and lots of fun to have in here.

The name for the text file is ex15_sample.txt. I tried with the above formula, and nothing seems to work. I have a hard understanding how to use both ARGV and STDIN.gets.chomp.

What should I do? I ask that you use the formula above; this stuff is a little confusing, so for now, just use the formula above.

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  • What do you mean by "specific script"? Do you mean "encoding"? And what is a "formula"? Commented Apr 26, 2013 at 14:06
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    How are you running the program: what exactly are you typing on the command line? And when you say nothing seems to work, what exactly do you mean: are there error messages? Commented Apr 26, 2013 at 14:17
  • @Jorg See, I don't know a whole lot of terms regarding what it is I'm doing. I'm a beginner...and I only know very basic things, so all of this is completely new to me. But to answer your questions: I don't know what I mean't by specific script since my question has been edited. I think that encoding what I might be trying to do. I say formula as in the one that says "ARGV.first, etc.. etc... Like I said, completely new. Commented Apr 26, 2013 at 17:14
  • @FMc Well, where it says "filename = ARGV.first" I fill in the filename with "ex15_sample.txt" and it gives me error messages all the time. So yes, every time I try to do something new, I just get error messages out of the yin yang. Commented Apr 26, 2013 at 17:16
  • @Jorg What I mean't by specific script is, the big script that reads "filename = ARGV.first, etc...etc.." Sorry, I forgot about the main question above. Commented Apr 26, 2013 at 17:18

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The script works. You're not explaining how you're trying to run the script or what errors you're seeing, so it's a bit hard to help you.

If you have a text file named ex15_sample.txt in the same directory as your script (let's call it script.rb), and if you have Ruby set up properly, then if you run it with

$ ruby script.rb ex15_sample.txt

everything should work fine.

If you're trying to change the first line to always use ex15_sample.txt, be sure to put it in quotes:

filename = "ex15_sample.txt" # Without the quotes, you'll get an error.

Again, it's hard to help you without knowing exactly how you're running the script or what errors you're getting.

Update: I seems your issue is that you aren't clear on how to run a Ruby script. The simplest way is to, at your system's command prompt, type ruby then a space, then the name of the file with a Ruby script in it. If your script is in a file named script.rb, you would type ruby script.rb. That won't work if your script is in a file with a different name. If the script is in a file named read-a-file.rb, then you need to type ruby read-a-file.rb.

This particular script wants a command line argument after the file name. If the text file you want to read is in a file named ex15_sample.txt, then you need to type that after the script name. In the previous example, the command would become ruby read-a-file.rb ex15_sample.txt. That will only work if the files are in the same directory (a.k.a. folder).

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12 Comments

Ok, lemme try it, and I'll come back to ya with my error messages.
Well, lemme ask you this question. When you say, if you run it with $ ruby script.rb ex15_sample.txt that it should work, what exactly do you mean? Do you mean from the command prompt? Like for ex: I type in irb, then type in what you put above and then should I get no error messages. Maybe that's the problem...maybe I dunno what to do to begin with. Basically I'm just trying to get Ruby to read that .txt file, that's all I'm really doing.
What floors me too is, I didn't have a problem with any of the tutorials up until this point. I don't get it.
Usin the script as it stands, trying to get the file name from ARGV, doesn't really make sense in irb. You would type ruby script.rb ex15_sample.txt instead of typing irb at the command prompt if you want to run the script in a file called script.rb. If you just want Ruby to read the file from within irb, you could just do File.read('ex15_sample.txt').
Well...lemme type in just ruby script.rb ex15_sample.txt in the command prompt and see what happens.
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