Defining methods inside methods

[Jim]

I've seen in a couple scripts now where methods have been def'd inside of another method def. It is allowable syntax in Ruby, but is this intentional? What advantages does this offer?

def a
  puts "a"
  def b
    puts "b"
  end
end

[CPhillips]

I dont think I have released any plugins that do that. But I have used it a few times to avoid copying a bunch of code into each case of a elaborate if or case statement.

I have also used it when debugging to override the behavior of a function like puts