Question

I have a string:

str="D\\projects\\myown\\java"

I assigned this string to two variables like:

str1=str
str2=str

After I did the below operation:

idgb1=str1.gsub!("\\","_")

I get str1 as D_projects_myown_java and str2 is the same. why does this happen? I don’t want str2 to change its value.

Answer 1

str1 and str2 are just references to str, the string is not copied to those variables. And String#gsub! updates the string in place.

If you want to keep str2 intact, you need to do it like this:

str2 = str.dup

or

str2 = str.clone

Besides, if you use String#gsub instead of String#gsub!, str and str2 will not be changed.