(ruby) variables with colons in front

[Pho Tek]

Are there any specific convention with regards to variable naming in Ruby?

I was looking at some rake tasks and was led to believe that their names have a colon in front because it is an internal DSL (according to Fowler).

Then I took a look at this; and variables with colon prefixes are everywhere.

Please enlighten me.

Thanks

Pho

[Mike Simmons]

In Ruby, an identifier that begins with a colon is a symbol.

[Pho Tek]

Thank you. So Symbols are basically interned Strings in java.

Regards,

Pho

[Marc Peabody]

Originally posted by Pho Tek:
Thank you. So Symbols are basically interned Strings in java.

Exactly.