Question

I have a function in Ruby:

def find_item(keyword)
    potential = []
    $items.each do |item|
        puts item                                 # <-- for debugging purposes
        if item["name"].downcase== keyword
            potential << item["name"].downcase
        elsif item["keywords"].index(keyword) != nil
            potential << item["name"].downcase
        end
    end
    return potential
end

(The global variable $items is a Hash object that maps a few strings to some values that determine the properties of the item.)

When I puts the current item it is iterating over (the line with the comment does just that), it gives me:

{"name"=>"Thing1", "keywords"=>["thing", "green"], ...}

but when I try item["name"] on the next line (which should definitely return Thing1), it gives me:

C:/somepath/someprogram.rb:125:in '[]': can't convert String into Integer (TypeError)

Answer 1

if $items is a Hash, then $items.each do |item| will yield [key, value] pairs (Arrays) to the block. If you only want the values, use each_value.