# Absolute paths in $"

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/absolute-paths-in/63514>\
**Category:** Ruby\
**Created:** [June 15, 2006, 8:19pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/absolute-paths-in/63514 "2006-06-15T20:19:59Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 8\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/4bbf92/32.png) [@unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/unknown)\
**Post date:** [June 15, 2006, 8:19pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/absolute-paths-in/63514/1 "2006-06-15T20:19:59Z")

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Any chance Ruby 1.8.5 will have absolute paths in $" instead of  
relative ones? I know that’s planned for 2.0 but I sure could use it  
now.

T.

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**Author:** ![unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/4bbf92/32.png) [@unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/unknown)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2006, 4:45am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/absolute-paths-in/63514/2 "2006-06-16T04:45:10Z")

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Hi,

In message “Re: Absolute paths in $”"  
on Fri, 16 Jun 2006 03:17:19 +0900, removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid writes:

|Any chance Ruby 1.8.5 will have absolute paths in $" instead of  
|relative ones? I know that’s planned for 2.0 but I sure could use it  
|now.

I’m afraid it’s too big change for 1.8 which is under stable mode.  
Any opinion?

```
						matz.
```

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/4bbf92/32.png) [@unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/unknown)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2006, 2:38pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/absolute-paths-in/63514/3 "2006-06-16T14:38:17Z")

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I’m a firm believer on maintaining stability and allowing code to run  
the same in tomorrow’s release as it did in yesterday’s (simply: 1.8.5  
should not function different from 1.8.4 or any prior/future versions  
of that stable branch).

With that being said, if any major changes are going to be made, just  
stick it in 1.9, yay 🙂

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**Author:** ![unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/4bbf92/32.png) [@unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/unknown)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2006, 3:12pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/absolute-paths-in/63514/4 "2006-06-16T15:12:59Z")

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Yukihiro M. wrote:

> Any opinion?  
> The change both simplifies code related to it and makes Ruby more  
> robust for having it. While it is “big” in a sense, I’d be pretty  
> surprised if any other projects besides mine and RubyGems would be  
> “adversely” affected. That being the case, maybe it’s worth moving up  
> in the time-line. 2.0 still seems to be a ways off.

In any case, I can work around it if neccessary.

Thanks,  
T.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/4bbf92/32.png) [@unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/unknown)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2006, 3:32pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/absolute-paths-in/63514/5 "2006-06-16T15:32:55Z")

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Hi,

In message “Re: Absolute paths in $”"  
on Fri, 16 Jun 2006 22:10:52 +0900, removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid writes:

|\> I’m afraid it’s too big change for 1.8 which is under stable mode.  
|\> Any opinion?  
|  
|The change both simplifies code related to it and makes Ruby more  
|robust for having it. While it is “big” in a sense, I’d be pretty  
|surprised if any other projects besides mine and RubyGems would be  
|“adversely” affected. That being the case, maybe it’s worth moving up  
|in the time-line. 2.0 still seems to be a ways off.

Compatibility goes beyond anyone’s expectation. I have just got  
a report that this exact issue broke someone’s code last week.

```
						matz.
```

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/4bbf92/32.png) [@unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/unknown)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2006, 3:33pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/absolute-paths-in/63514/6 "2006-06-16T15:33:27Z")

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On Fri, Jun 16, 2006 at 11:42:18AM +0900, Yukihiro M. wrote:

> Any opinion?  
> Such a change would be likely to affect RubyGems and  
> applications/libraries  
> using it, and in particular Rails, which does funny things with $:.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/4bbf92/32.png) [@unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/unknown)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2006, 4:08pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/absolute-paths-in/63514/7 "2006-06-16T16:08:17Z")

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On 16-jun-2006, at 4:42, Yukihiro M. wrote:

> Any opinion?  
> I would welcome it, for one. Right now you have to expand\_path  
> everything manually and  
> in Rails it becomes very difficult to follow all the …/…/…/ properly.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/4bbf92/32.png) [@unknown](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/unknown)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2006, 8:13pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/absolute-paths-in/63514/8 "2006-06-16T20:13:02Z")

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On Jun 16, 2006, at 7:05 AM, Julian ‘Julik’ Tarkhanov wrote:

> > Any opinion?
> 
> I would welcome it, for one. Right now you have to expand\_path  
> everything manually and in Rails it becomes very difficult to  
> follow all the …/…/…/ properly.

That sounds more like a Rails bug, it should be expanding paths for you.

–  
Eric H. - removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid - [http://blog.segment7.net](http://blog.segment7.net)  
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