Ruby Under a Microscope

Chapter 2. Compilation

The code Ruby actually runs looks nothing like your original code.

Now that Ruby has tokenized and parsed your code, is it ready to run it? Will it finally get to work and iterate through the block 10 times in my simple 10.times do example? If not, what else could Ruby possibly have to do first?

Starting with version 1.9, Ruby compiles your code before executing it. The word compile means to translate your code from one programming language to another. Your programming language is easy for you to understand, while usually the target language is easy for the computer to understand.

For example, when you compile a C program, the ...