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Ruby Ruby Basics (Retired) Ruby Numbers Different Kinds of Numbers

Posted by Emmanuel Idiong
Emmanuel Idiong
5,953 Points

variables

why can't you write the syntax as year = "2015"

2 Answers

Geoff Parsons
Geoff Parsons
11,679 Points

When you set a variable to a value contained in quotes it becomes a String. Strings will have different methods than numbers will so you won't be able to perform the same operations. For instance:

   >> "100" + "10"
   => "10010"
   >> 100 + 10
   => 110

You can however cast a variable from a string to a number with String#to_i and String#to_f. These attempt to convert a string to an integer and floating point number respectively. These are useful for dealing with user input as it will usually come to you as a string even if you were asking the user for a number.

Emmanuel Idiong
Emmanuel Idiong
5,953 Points
Emmanuel Idiong
Emmanuel Idiong
5,953 Points

Thanks Geoff that was really helpful.