Ruby on Rails Study Guide: Blocks, Procs, and Lambdas

Ruby is a language with a set of powerful features - the most powerful arguably being Blocks, Procs, and Lambdas. In short, these features allow you to pass code to a method and execute that code at a later time. Despite regularly using these features, many developers don't fully understand the subtle differences between them.

Study Guides: When applying for a programming job, you’ll often be presented with a quiz that intends to determine your level of knowledge and experience in a given subject. The various articles in this series provide condensed solutions to the questions that you might expect to see on such tests.

Blocks

A block is code that is implicitly passed to a method through the use of either curly braces, {...}, or do...end syntax. It's common convention to use {...} for single line blocks, and do...end for multi-line blocks. For example, the following blocks are functionally the same:

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array = [1,2,3,4] array.map! do |n|   n * n end => [1, 4, 9, 16] array = [1,2,3,4]  array.map! { |n| n * n }  => [1, 4, 9, 16]

The magic behind a block is the yield keyword; it defers the execution of the calling method in order to evaluate the block. The result of the block, if any, is then evaluated by any remaining code in the method. The yield statement can also accept parameters, which are then passed into and evaluated within the block. Tying this together, a simple example of the map! above method would be the following:

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class Array   def map!     self.each_with_index do |value, index|       self[index] = yield(value)     end   end end

This simple representation of map! calls the each_with_index method and replaces the item at the given index with the result of the block. While this is a trivial example of block usage, it helps to show yield's power. The uses of blocks in Ruby are endless, and we frequently use them in our code.

Procs

The above example demonstrates a minor limitation of blocks: they are syntax and disposable. We have to retype blocks every time we reuse them on different arrays, but we can store a block for later use by using the Ruby Proc Object. We can store a Proc in a variable, and then explicitly pass it to any method that accepts a callable object. Rewriting the above example as a Proc would look like the following:

1	number_squared = Proc.new { |n| n * n }

Let's modify our map! method to accept and call the Proc object:

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class Array   def map!(proc_object)     self.each_with_index do |value, index|       self[index] = proc_object.call(value)     end   end end array = [1,2,3,4] array.map!(number_squared) => [1, 4, 9, 16]

Take note that we no longer use the yield keyword; instead, we directly use the callmethod on the Proc object, passing it the value from the array. We receive the same result as before, but we store our block in a variable to reuse a later time.

Lambdas

Lambda function are almost identical to Procs but with two key differences. First, a lambda checks the the number of arguments it receives and returns an ArgumentErrorif they do not match. For example:

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l = lambda { "I'm a lambda" } l.call => "I'm a lambda" l.call('arg') ArgumentError: wrong number of arguments (1 for 0)

Second, lambdas provide diminutive returns - meaning that when a Proc encounters a return statement in it's execution, it halts the method and returns the provided value. Lambdas on the other hand, return their value to the method, allowing it to continue:

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def proc_math   Proc.new { return 1 + 1 }.call   return 2 + 2 end def lambda_math   lambda { return 1 + 1 }.call   return 2 + 2 end proc_math # => 2  lambda_math # => 4

As you can see proc_math hits the return statement inside the Proc and returns the value of 2. In contrast, lambda_math skips the return statement and evaluates 2 + 2 instead.

One final note: Ruby 1.9 introduces the new "stabby" lambda syntax (represented with ->), which is functionally identical to the traditional lambda syntax, but the "stabby" syntax is much cleaner.

Conclusion

In this study guide, we've covered the key differences between Blocks, Procs, and Lambdas:

• Blocks are single use.
• Procs exist as objects.
• Lambdas have strict argument checking.