While eigenclass is way cooler, singleton class makes more sense now that you have to do some funky, funky stuff to make a new instance based off of an existing object.

Perhaps it’s actually a good thing to use an unfamiliar term for what is probably, to most people learning Ruby, an unfamiliar concept. That way people won’t draw unwarranted conclusions about the concept from the word itself.

Besides, a simple explanation that “eigen” == “its own” should make the choice of terminology perfectly clear to people who grok the concept.

Danno, I really want the instantiating an eigenclass to get defunkified.

I like the term ‘shadow class’ but so far that seems unpopular. But it shadows the real class…

What is wrong with the term “metaclass”? That has been standard in OOP terminology since the 1980s.

Class is a meta class. It’s the class of classes. The word is already used for that.

Class is a meta class. It’s the class of classes. The word is already used for that.

Class is a meta class. It’s the class of classes. The word is already used for that.

Before, we only confused the OOP newbies. Now, we can also confuse the OOP experts.

Danno, actually, a while ago I found a much simpler way to do prototyped objects in Ruby:

# You have to do it this way. class Proto < Class will die.
Proto = Class.new(Class)
def Proto.clone; Class.new(self) end

a = Proto.clone
def a.ans
  42
end

puts a.ans

def b.foo
  super.to_s(2)
end

puts b.foo

Works well enough for me on 1.8.5 with no evil.rb in sight.

err….

b = a.clone

Should try to run things before not after.

hmm. last correction: foo should be ans.

I guess that’s what you get for writing code in public ;-)

I think using singleton is a mistake.

Damn, I guess this means my idea for using “Highlander” is out. Because, you know, there can be only one.

why is there a horse on your duck?