What are closures in Ruby on Rails?

What are closures in Ruby on Rails?

Closures in Ruby are blocks of code that can capture the local variables from their surrounding context. In Rails, they are often used in callbacks and scopes.

Can you give me an example of how to use closures in a Rails app?

Sure! Here's a simple example: you can define a scope in a model using a closure to filter records based on a condition. For instance:

class Post < ApplicationRecord
  scope :published, -> { where(published: true) }
end

What are the benefits of using closures?

Closures help in encapsulating behavior, making your code cleaner and more modular. They also allow for lazy evaluation and can improve performance.

Are there any drawbacks to using closures?

Yes, one drawback is that they can lead to memory bloat if not managed properly, as they keep references to their surrounding context.