Built-ins

Built-ins provide certain functionality that is always available. Typically, a built-in provides a different version of a variable, or information about the variable in question. The syntax for accessing a built-in is the same as for accessing a sub-variable in a hash, except that you use the question mark instead of a dot. For example, to get the upper case version of a string: user?upper_case.

The following section lists the most commonly used built-ins. You can find a complete list of built-ins in Built-Ins Reference.

Built-ins to use with strings

Built-in Name	Description
html	The string with all special HTML characters replaced by entity references (E.g. < with &lt;)
cap_first	The string with the first letter converted to upper case
lower_case	The lowercase version of the string
upper_case	The uppercase version of the string
trim	The string without leading and trailing white spaces

Built-ins to use with sequences

Built-in Name	Description
size	The number of elements in the sequence

Built-ins to use with numbers

Built-in Name	Description
int	The integer part of a number (e.g. -1.9?int is -1)

Example:

Assuming that test stores the string “Tom & Jerry’'', the output will be:

Note the test?upper_case?html. Since the result of test?upper_case is a string, you can use the html built-in with it.

Another example:

Assuming that seasons stores the sequence "winter", "spring", "summer", "autumn", the output will be:

Next steps

Calling methods

Learn more

Built-Ins Reference