Hello, and welcome back! Are you ready for a new challenge? In this unit, we're stepping up a notch to tackle a complex yet intriguing task. It involves parsing complex strings into Ruby hashes and then updating them, a common requirement in many real-world tasks. So yes, this unit's session is going to be quite pragmatic — just the way you like it!
This task involves transforming a given string into a nested Ruby hash and updating a specific key-value pair within that hash. The input string will take the form "Key1=Value1,Key2=Value2,..."
. When a part of the value is another key-value string, we create a nested hash.
For example, the string "A1=B1,C1={D1=E1,F1=G1},I1=J1"
should be transformed into the following nested hash:
Your Ruby function should parse this string into the above hash, then update the value of the nested key F1
from G1
to some other value, say 'NewValue'
. The function should ultimately return the updated hash.
Our first step here will be to parse the string into a nested hash. Before diving into coding, let us understand that simple string splitting methods do not handle hierarchical structures well; hence, our solution needs to account for the nested nature of our text.
As you parse the string, you'll have to read through each character and note its role. Here's a hint: every time the symbol is encountered, you can infer that the text bit you have on your hands is a key. Further, upon hitting the symbol, you should gather that you've just finished reading a value. At this stage, it is safe to add the key-value pair you've just read into the hash you're constructing.
