Magic First and Last Indicator in a Loop in Ruby/Rails?

You could grab the first and last elements and process them differently, if you like.

first = array.shift
last = array.pop
process_first_one
array.each { |x| process_middle_bits }
process_last_one

If the code for the first and last iteration has nothing in common with the code for the other iterations, you could also do:

do_something( a.first )
a[1..-2].each do |x|
  do_something_else( x )
end
do_something_else_else( a.last )

If the different cases have some code in common, your way is fine.

What if you could do this?

%w(a b c d).each.with_position do |e, position|
  p [e, position]    # => ["a", :first]
                     # => ["b", :middle]
                     # => ["c", :middle]
                     # => ["d", :last]
end

Or this?

%w(a, b, c, d).each_with_index.with_position do |(e, index), position|
  p [e, index, position]    # => ["a,", 0, :first]
                            # => ["b,", 1, :middle]
                            # => ["c,", 2, :middle]
                            # => ["d", 3, :last]
end

In MRI >= 1.8.7, all it takes is this monkey-patch:

class Enumerable::Enumerator

  def with_position(&block)
    state = :init
    e = nil
    begin
      e_last = e
      e = self.next
      case state
      when :init
        state = :first
      when :first
        block.call(e_last, :first)
        state = :middle
      when :middle
        block.call(e_last, :middle)
      end
    rescue StopIteration
      case state
      when :first
        block.call(e_last, :first)
      when :middle
        block.call(e_last, :last)
      end
      return
    end while true
  end

end

It's got a little state engine because it must look ahead one iteration.

The trick is that each, each_with_index, &c. return an Enumerator if given no block. Enumerators do everything an Enumerable does and a bit more. But for us, the important thing is that we can monkey-patch Enumerator to add one more way to iterate, "wrapping" the existing iteration, whatever it is.

Or a tiny little Domain Specific Language:

a = [1, 2, 3, 4]

FirstMiddleLast.iterate(a) do
  first do |e|
    p [e, 'first']
  end
  middle do |e|
    p [e, 'middle']
  end
  last do |e|
    p [e, 'last']
  end
end

# => [1, "first"]
# => [2, "middle"]
# => [3, "middle"]
# => [4, "last"]

and the code that makes it go:

class FirstMiddleLast

  def self.iterate(array, &block)
    fml = FirstMiddleLast.new(array)
    fml.instance_eval(&block)
    fml.iterate
  end

  attr_reader :first, :middle, :last

  def initialize(array)
    @array = array
  end

  def first(&block)
    @first = block
  end

  def middle(&block)
    @middle = block
  end

  def last(&block)
    @last = block
  end

  def iterate
    @first.call(@array.first) unless @array.empty?
    if @array.size > 1
      @array[1..-2].each do |e|
        @middle.call(e)
      end
      @last.call(@array.last)
    end
  end

end

I started thinking, "if only you could pass multiple blocks to a Ruby function, then you could have a slick and easy solution to this question." Then I realized that DSL's play little tricks that are almost like passing multiple blocks.

If you are willing to add some boilerplate, you can add something like this to the array class:

class Array
  def each_fl
    each_with_index do |x,i|
      yield [i==0 ? :first : (i==length-1 ? :last : :inner), x]
    end
  end
end

and then anywhere you need to, you get the following syntax:

[1,2,3,4].each_fl do |t,x|
  case t
    when :first
      puts "first: #{x}"
    when :last
      puts "last: #{x}"
    else
      puts "otherwise: #{x}"
  end
end

for the following output:

first: 1
otherwise: 2
otherwise: 3
last: 4

There's no "do this the (first|last) time" syntax in Ruby. But if you're looking for succinctness, you could do this:

a.each_with_index do |x, i|
  print (i > 0 ? (i == a.length - 1 ? x*10 : x) : x+1)
end

The result is what you'd expect:

irb(main):001:0> a = Array.new(5,1)
=> [1, 1, 1, 1, 1]
irb(main):002:0> a.each_with_index do |x,i|
irb(main):003:1*   puts (i > 0 ? (i == a.length - 1 ? x*10 : x) : x+1)
irb(main):004:1> end
2
1
1
1
10

Interesting question, and one I've thought a bit about as well.

I think you'd have to create three different blocks/procs/whatever they're called, and then create a method that calls the correct block/proc/whatever. (Sorry for the vagueness - I'm not yet a black belt metaprogrammer) [Edit: however, I've copied from someone who is at the bottom)

class FancyArray
  def initialize(array)
    @boring_array = array
    @first_code = nil
    @main_code = nil
    @last_code = nil
  end

  def set_first_code(&code)
    @first_code = code
  end

  def set_main_code(&code)
    @main_code = code
  end

  def set_last_code(&code)
    @last_code = code
  end

  def run_fancy_loop
    @boring_array.each_with_index do |item, i|
      case i
      when 0 then @first_code.call(item)
      when @boring_array.size - 1 then @last_code.call(item)
      else @main_code.call(item)
      end
    end
  end
end

fancy_array = FancyArray.new(["Matti Nykanen", "Erik Johnsen", "Michael Edwards"])
fancy_array.set_first_code {|item| puts "#{item} came first in ski jumping at the 1988 Winter Olympics"}
fancy_array.set_main_code {|item| puts "#{item} did not come first or last in ski jumping at the 1988 Winter Olympics"}
fancy_array.set_last_code {|item| puts "#{item} came last in ski jumping at the 1988 Winter Olympics"}
fancy_array.run_fancy_loop

produces

Matti Nykanen came first in ski jumping at the 1988 Winter Olympics
Erik Johnsen did not come first or last in ski jumping at the 1988 Winter Olympics
Michael Edwards came last in ski jumping at the 1988 Winter Olympics

Edit: Svante's answer (with molf's suggestion) to a related question shows how to pass in multiple code blocks to a single method:

class FancierArray < Array
  def each_with_first_last(first_code, main_code, last_code)
    each_with_index do |item, i|
      case i
        when 0 then first_code.call(item)
        when size - 1 then last_code.call(item)
        else main_code.call(item)
      end
    end
  end
end

fancier_array = FancierArray.new(["Matti Nykanen", "Erik Johnsen", "Michael Edwards"])
fancier_array.each_with_first_last(
  lambda {|person| puts "#{person} came first in ski jumping at the 1988 Winter Olympics"},
  lambda {|person| puts "#{person} did not come first or last in ski jumping at the 1988 Winter Olympics"},
  lambda {|person| puts "#{person} came last in ski jumping at the 1988 Winter Olympics"})

If you don't mind that the "last" action happens before the stuff in the middle, then this monkey-patch:

class Array

  def for_first
    return self if empty?
    yield(first)
    self[1..-1]
  end

  def for_last
    return self if empty?
    yield(last)
    self[0...-1]
  end

end

Allows this:

%w(a b c d).for_first do |e|
  p ['first', e]
end.for_last do |e|
  p ['last', e]
end.each do |e|
  p ['middle', e]
end

# => ["first", "a"]
# => ["last", "d"]
# => ["middle", "b"]
# => ["middle", "c"]

Partition the array into ranges where elements within each range are supposed to behave different. Map each range thus created to a block.

class PartitionEnumerator
    include RangeMaker

    def initialize(array)
        @array = array
        @handlers = {}
    end

    def add(range, handler)
        @handlers[range] = handler
    end

    def iterate
        @handlers.each_pair do |range, handler|
          @array[range].each { |value| puts handler.call(value) }
        end
    end
end

Could create ranges by hand, but these helpers below make it easier:

module RangeMaker
  def create_range(s)
    last_index = @array.size - 1
    indexes = (0..last_index)
    return (indexes.first..indexes.first) if s == :first
    return (indexes.second..indexes.second_last) if s == :middle
    return (indexes.last..indexes.last) if s == :last
  end  
end

class Range
  def second
    self.first + 1
  end

  def second_last
    self.last - 1
  end
end

Usage:

a = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]

e = PartitionEnumerator.new(a)
e.add(e.create_range(:first), Proc.new { |x| x + 1 } )
e.add(e.create_range(:middle), Proc.new { |x| x * 10 } )
e.add(e.create_range(:last), Proc.new { |x| x } )

e.iterate

I see a lot of hacks here that are pretty close, but all heavily dependent on the given iterator having a fixed size and NOT being an iterator. I'd like to also propose saving the previous element as you iterate through to know the first/last element that was iterated over.

previous = {}
elements.each do |element|
  unless previous.has_key?(:element)
    # will only execute the first time
  end

  # normal each block here

  previous[:element] = element
end

# the last element will be stored in previous[:element] 

If you know the items in the array are unique (unlike this case), you can do this:

a = [1,2,3,4,5]

a.each_with_index do |x, i|
  if x == a.first
    print x+1
  elsif x == a.last
    print x*10
  else
    print x
  end
end