Scope in Ruby and Python

Question

I've been learning Ruby and Python concurrently and one of the things I noticed is that these 2 languages seem to treat scope differently. Here's an example of what I mean:

# Python
a = 5
def myfunc():
  print a

myfunc() # => Successfully prints 5

# Ruby
a = 5
def myfunc
  puts a
end

myfunc # => Throws a "NameError: undefined local variable or method `a' for main:Object"

It appears that def block can access variables declared outside of its immediate scope in Python but not in Ruby. Can someone confirm whether my understanding is correct? And if so, whether one of these ways of thinking of scope is more common in programming?

Answer 1

Disclaimer: I'm no python expert

In python, where variables defined in a module are, by default, module variables and as such global to that module. In Ruby, when you define a lowercase variable, it is always a local variable. Local variables are only accessible in the block that defined them and in procs/lambdas defined in that block that wrap the variable.

In Ruby, for a variable to cross scopes, it needs to be either:

• A constant (ALL_CAPS): Always accessible, if prefixed with the right scope
• Class variable (@@double_at): Always accessible from the defining class and any subclasses, but not from outside
• Instance variable (@single_at): Accessible only from within that object, and from outside with getter methods/get_instance_variable.
• Global ($starts_with_dollar): A bad idea. Crosses all scopes, no scoping needed. Do not use!

Answer 2

In Ruby if you want to access a variable defined outside the method you are invoking you need to define it as global. Ruby try to match the variable defined in the local scope, if does not find it, throw an exception.

You can define a global variable with $ sign.

$a = 5
def myfunc
  puts $a
end

myfunc

However as a general rule is not a good practice to define global variables otherwise will risk to pollute the global namespace.

Answer 3

You can use dis module to see what Python is doing.

import dis

a = 5
def myfunc():
  print a

Result:

>>> dis.dis(myfunc)
 15           0 LOAD_GLOBAL              0 (a)
              3 PRINT_ITEM          
              4 PRINT_NEWLINE       
              5 LOAD_CONST               0 (None)
              8 RETURN_VALUE

So you can see that a is in the global scope.