Question

I am new to Ruby. I am familiar with several other languages. My question is about calling methods out of order. For example:

def myfunction
    myfunction2
end

def myfunction2
    puts "in 2"
end

How could I call myfunction2 before it is declared? Several languages let you declare it at the top or in a .h file. How does ruby handle it?

Do I always need to follow this:

def myfunction2
    puts "in 2"
end

def myfunction
    myfunction2
end

Mainly this bugs me when I need to call another method inside of def initialize for a class.

Answer 1

You can not call a method before you define it. However, that does not mean you can’t define myfunction before myfunction2! Ruby has late binding, so the call to myfunction2 in myfunction will not be associated with the actual myfunction2 before you call myfunction. That means that as long as the first call to myfunction is done after myfunction2 is declared, you should be fine.

So, this is ok:

def myfunction
    myfunction2
end

def myfunction2
    puts "in 2"
end

myfunction

and this is not:

def myfunction
    myfunction2
end

myfunction

def myfunction2
    puts "in 2"
end