String.duplicate - syntax suggestion

Hi everyone, first topic here! currently I’m finishing the ‘Programming Elixir 1.3’ book and I wondered about something…

The String.duplicate\2 function name is not clear… I say this because, at least in my point of view when I say duplicate it automatically referts to make it twice (What’s the meaning of duplicate 3 times ??)

So String.duplicate("a") would return "aa"

It would be something like String.replicate\2 or String.repeat\2 (Replicate n-times or repeat n-times).

I hope I get understood, English isn’t my native language and I’m just learning Elixir at the moment.

Thanks for the wonderful community.

Kisses to everyone :smiley:

1 Like

As a native English speaker it makes sense to me, it is used as a verb (where your usage seems to be as a noun):

verb
ˈd(y)o͞opləˌkāt/
1.
make or be an exact copy of.
"a unique scent, impossible to duplicate or forget"
synonyms:	copy, photocopy, xerox, reproduce, replicate, reprint, run off; 

And since it takes an integer number to be the number of times to duplicate it it makes sense to me, although perhaps that number should default to 2 would make sense.

2 Likes

I never thought of it before, but I think he is right.

Hal

2 Likes