# No documentation for File's methods? **URL:** \ **Category:** Ruby\ **Created:** [May 7, 2009, 10:33am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/no-documentation-for-files-methods/167384 "2009-05-07T10:33:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/alby)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2009, 10:33am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/no-documentation-for-files-methods/167384/1 "2009-05-07T10:33:22Z")
We can do the following… File.open(‘somefile.txt’) File.foreach(‘somefile’) …and I’m trying to see the documentation for these class methods. So I execute “ri File#open” and “ri File#foreach” and I get nothing. I installed fast-ri and I execute “qri File#foreach” and, again, get nothing. Interestingly, when I do “qri File#open” I get the documentation for “Kernel#open”. However, File#open isn’t kernel#open because the latter can open a subprocess (as in “cmd = open(’|date’)”). So I know that “qri File#open” too doesn’t give me the documentation for File#open. So my question is: How do I get documentaiton for the methods of class File? ---
**Author:** ![alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/alby)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2009, 10:44am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/no-documentation-for-files-methods/167384/2 "2009-05-07T10:44:13Z")
Albert S. wrote: > [snip] > So I execute “ri File#open” and “ri File#foreach” and I get nothing. My, my, my. I used ‘#’ instead of ‘.’. My fault. But it doesn’t change much when I fix my error: ri “File.open” and “ri File.foreach” return nothing. “qri File.open” returns documentation for Kernel#open, which isn’t correct. “qri File.foreach” is an improvement! I get documentation for IO::foreach. That’s good. But… why doesn’t “qri File.open” gives me the documentation for “IO::open”? And why the heck doesn’t “qri IO.open” give me the documentation for “IO.open”?! WWWwwwooooooooooooowwwww!!! It’s like a russian roulette. You shoot in the dark hoping to get documentation for something, and go figure the meaning of what you get. I’m sad. ---
**Author:** ![alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/alby)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2009, 10:46am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/no-documentation-for-files-methods/167384/3 "2009-05-07T10:46:00Z")
I forgot to mention my software: ruby 1.8.7 (2008-08-11 patchlevel 72) [i486-linux] ri v1.0.1 - 20041108 fri 0.3.1 (2008-02-02) (Ubuntu 9.04 system.) ---
**Author:** ![alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/alby)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2009, 5:16pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/no-documentation-for-files-methods/167384/4 "2009-05-07T17:16:47Z")
On Thu, May 7, 2009 at 4:33 AM, Albert S. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > I installed fast-ri and I execute “qri File#foreach” and, again, get > nothing. > > Interestingly, when I do “qri File#open” I get the documentation for > “Kernel#open”. However, File#open isn’t kernel#open because the latter > can open a subprocess (as in “cmd = open(‘|date’)”). So I know that “qri > File#open” too doesn’t give me the documentation for File#open. > > So my question is: > > How do I get documentaiton for the methods of class File? perhaps you need to rebuild the index fastri-server -b – Rick DeNatale Blog: [http://talklikeaduck.denhaven2.com/](http://talklikeaduck.denhaven2.com/) Twitter: [http://twitter.com/RickDeNatale](http://twitter.com/RickDeNatale) WWR: [http://www.workingwithrails.com/person/9021-rick-denatale](http://www.workingwithrails.com/person/9021-rick-denatale) LinkedIn: [http://www.linkedin.com/in/rickdenatale](http://www.linkedin.com/in/rickdenatale) ---
**Author:** ![alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/alby)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2009, 6:16pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/no-documentation-for-files-methods/167384/5 "2009-05-07T18:16:00Z")
Albert S. wrote: > We can do the following… > > File.open(‘somefile.txt’) > > File.foreach(‘somefile’) > > …and I’m trying to see the documentation for these class methods. > > So I execute “ri File#open” and “ri File#foreach” and I get nothing. Wrong class: they are defined in IO, File just inherits them. jwm ---
**Author:** ![alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/alby)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2009, 7:09pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/no-documentation-for-files-methods/167384/6 "2009-05-07T19:09:58Z")
2009/5/7 Jörg W Mittag [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid): > Wrong class: they are defined in IO, File just inherits them. ## True, but fri/qri finds inherited methods: $ qri File.open ------------------------------------------------------------ Kernel#open open(path [, mode [, perm]] ) =\> io or nil open(path [, mode [, perm]] ) {|io| block } =\> obj … ## $ qri File.foreach ------------------------------------------------------------ IO::foreach IO.foreach(name, sep\_string=$/) {|line| block } =\> nil … I suspect the OP has a corrupted fast\_ri index which needs to be rebuilt. – Rick DeNatale Blog: [http://talklikeaduck.denhaven2.com/](http://talklikeaduck.denhaven2.com/) Twitter: [http://twitter.com/RickDeNatale](http://twitter.com/RickDeNatale) WWR: [http://www.workingwithrails.com/person/9021-rick-denatale](http://www.workingwithrails.com/person/9021-rick-denatale) LinkedIn: [http://www.linkedin.com/in/rickdenatale](http://www.linkedin.com/in/rickdenatale) ---
**Author:** ![alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/alby)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2009, 9:08am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/no-documentation-for-files-methods/167384/7 "2009-05-08T09:08:00Z")
Hi, people! I’m the original poster. I discovered an error on my part: I should have used ‘::’ instead of ‘.’. That’s because I’m looking for the class methods. However, that didn’t solve my problem completely: Rick Denatale wrote: > True, but fri/qri finds inherited methods: > $ qri File.open > […] Now, suppose I want the documentation for File::new. What should I do? I do the following: ## $ qri File::new ---------------------------------------------------------------- IO::new IO.new(fd, mode\_string) =\> io ``` Returns a new IO object (a stream) for the given integer file descriptor and mode string. See also IO#fileno and IO::for_fd. ``` That’s wrong. I get documentation for IO::new that involves some numeric ‘fd’ parameter. How do I get the documentation for File::new? (I did rebuilt fast\_ri’s index.) ---
**Author:** ![alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/alby)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2009, 1:52pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/no-documentation-for-files-methods/167384/8 "2009-05-08T13:52:51Z")
On Fri, May 8, 2009 at 7:46 AM, Rick DeNatale [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > > ``` > > IO.new(fd, mode_string) => io > > > > ``` > > I don’t know. The problem might be that fastri is behind and recent > changes to rdoc have led to incompatibilities. See the comments here > [http://blog.segment7.net/articles/2009/01/28/rdoc-rdoc\_chm-rdoc\_html\_templates-2-3-0-released](http://blog.segment7.net/articles/2009/01/28/rdoc-rdoc_chm-rdoc_html_templates-2-3-0-released) > > I fear that Mauricio has lost interest in his Ruby stuff and appears > to have moved off to other shiny objects. It looks like the solution is to go back to using ri rather than fri/qri, sigh. The ri command now uses a cache so that after the first time, it’s faster than it used to be. – Rick DeNatale Blog: [http://talklikeaduck.denhaven2.com/](http://talklikeaduck.denhaven2.com/) Twitter: [http://twitter.com/RickDeNatale](http://twitter.com/RickDeNatale) WWR: [http://www.workingwithrails.com/person/9021-rick-denatale](http://www.workingwithrails.com/person/9021-rick-denatale) LinkedIn: [http://www.linkedin.com/in/rickdenatale](http://www.linkedin.com/in/rickdenatale) ---
**Author:** ![alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@alby](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/alby)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2009, 1:47pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/no-documentation-for-files-methods/167384/9 "2009-05-08T13:47:34Z")
On Fri, May 8, 2009 at 3:08 AM, Albert S. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > Hi, people! I’m the original poster. > That’s wrong. I get documentation for IO::new that involves some numeric > ‘fd’ parameter. > > How do I get the documentation for File::new? I don’t know. The problem might be that fastri is behind and recent changes to rdoc have led to incompatibilities. See the comments here [http://blog.segment7.net/articles/2009/01/28/rdoc-rdoc\_chm-rdoc\_html\_templates-2-3-0-released](http://blog.segment7.net/articles/2009/01/28/rdoc-rdoc_chm-rdoc_html_templates-2-3-0-released) I fear that Mauricio has lost interest in his Ruby stuff and appears to have moved off to other shiny objects. – Rick DeNatale Blog: [http://talklikeaduck.denhaven2.com/](http://talklikeaduck.denhaven2.com/) Twitter: [http://twitter.com/RickDeNatale](http://twitter.com/RickDeNatale) WWR: [http://www.workingwithrails.com/person/9021-rick-denatale](http://www.workingwithrails.com/person/9021-rick-denatale) LinkedIn: [http://www.linkedin.com/in/rickdenatale](http://www.linkedin.com/in/rickdenatale)