gistfile1.rb

# Symbol to Proc is a mutha' fucking dirty hack. It brings the indirection
# that we hated from Pearl to Ruby. How it made it into core I don't know.
# Anyway, rather than bitch and moan too much, here is an alternative method
# which is much more expressive and has the same number of characters. The
# name pick comes from Rebol, though it functions more like select there.

# Benchmark:
#       user     system      total        real
#   0.200000   0.000000   0.200000 (  0.212325)
#   0.470000   0.000000   0.470000 (  0.475471)

require 'benchmark'

module Enumerable
  def pick(meth)
    map {|o| o.send(meth.to_sym)}
  end
end

class Symbol
  def to_proc
    Proc.new { |*args| args.shift.__send__(self, *args) }
  end
end

N = 10000

Benchmark.bm do |x|
  x.report do
    N.times do
      %W( d e a t h _ t o _ s y m _ t o _ p r o c).pick(:upcase).join
    end
  end

  x.report do
    N.times do
      %W( d e a t h _ t o _ s y m _ t o _ p r o c).map(&:upcase).join
    end
  end
end