Ruby :symbols
Ruby symbols should be just immutable strings to avoid all that mess with string/symbol keys in option hashes. Just treat every literal string as immutable one. You could even keep this nice syntax with a colon to save some keystrokes.
So, basically:
String.should < ImmutableString
“symbol”.should == :symbol
Parser still fills a table of symbol when it encounters literal strings in the source code. So the unique number is just a string object_id.
When you compare two strings, you compare ids first and if they are not the same, you proceed with byte comparison. No need to convert :symbol.to_s.
How to make string a mutable one? Just #dup or #clone it.
“symbol”.dup.class.should == String