Why methods always return a value in Ruby - See It in Action

Why methods always return a value in Ruby

📖 Scenario: Imagine you are baking cookies and you want to know how many cookies you made after baking. In Ruby, methods are like your baking process. They always give you a result back, just like you always get cookies after baking.

🎯 Goal: You will create a simple Ruby method that adds two numbers and see how it always returns a value, even if you don't explicitly say so.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a method called add_numbers that takes two parameters a and b

Inside the method, add a and b without using the return keyword

Create a variable called result that calls add_numbers with 5 and 7

Print the value of result

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Understanding that methods always return a value helps you write clear and predictable Ruby programs, like calculating totals or processing data.

💼 Career

Ruby developers often rely on implicit returns to write concise code, which is common in web development and scripting tasks.

1

Create the add_numbers method

Write a method called add_numbers that takes two parameters a and b. Inside the method, add a and b without using the return keyword.

Ruby

# Define the add_numbers method with parameters a and b
# Your code here

Need a hint?

In Ruby, the last line of a method is automatically returned. You don't need to write return.

2

Call the add_numbers method and store the result

Create a variable called result that calls the add_numbers method with the arguments 5 and 7.

Ruby

def add_numbers(a, b)
  a + b
end

# Call add_numbers with 5 and 7 and store in result
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use result = add_numbers(5, 7) to call the method and save the answer.

3

Print the result variable

Write a line to print the value of the variable result.

Ruby

def add_numbers(a, b)
  a + b
end

result = add_numbers(5, 7)

# Print the result
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use puts result to show the output on the screen.

4

Observe the method return value

Run the program and observe that the method add_numbers returns the sum of 5 and 7, which is printed.

Ruby

def add_numbers(a, b)
  a + b
end

result = add_numbers(5, 7)

puts result

# Run the program to see the output

Need a hint?

The output should be 12 because 5 + 7 = 12.