December topic: match-case / Structural Pattern Matching in Python and Ruby

In the beginning was C’s switch statement, which allowed choosing between multiple options, but was never adopted by dynamic languages because it didn’t really do anything that a series of if statements couldn’t do.

But then came match-case statements, or Structural Pattern Matching, made popular in languages like Rust and Scala. At first glimpse they look like C’s switch, but they actually have a lot more subtle power.

Ruby’s version 2.7 (from 2019) and Python’s newest release, 3.10, both have implementions of Structural Pattern Matching. It’s pretty cutting-edge in both cases, so you can be the first kid on your block to put these interesting features to use. Your Mom will be so proud!

We’ll also discussed what we learned at Ohio LinuxFest!

Location reminder

Innovation Hub - not Brixx!

We’ve begun to meet in the Innovation Hub, a gorgeous new facility that’s part of the renovated Dayton Arcade complex. Enter through the doors that face the Wright Stop Plaza bus hub.

Street parking is free in the evening. I usually park on Ludlow Street.

or

if for any reason coming downtown doesn’t work for you (for instance, you’ve been exposed to COVID, or you’ve converted yourself to purely digital format and now exist as a set of cloud-hosted algorithms), we’ll be online as well!

Join us at 7 PM EDT on the PyFri Discord channel, discord.gg/9SgTh3T, and click on the General voice chat link. You may need to install the Discord desktop app rather than just using the web interface.