As we know we see *args as an argument in method definition it means we can pass multiple parameters. See the below example

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class Test
  def initialize(*args)
    puts args
  end
end
Test.new('a', 'b') =>
a
b

But what if we just have asterisk(splat operator) as an argument?

I was looking Rails code base and found asterisk(*) in an class initialize method.

Link: https://github.com/rails/rails/blob/master/railties/lib/rails/commands/server.rb#L42

Let’s take an example –:

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def hello(a, *)
  puts a
end
hello('rays', 'b')
rays

How many arguments you passed it wont generate any error

Let’s take another example

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class A
  def initialize(argument=nil)
    puts "#{argument}"
    puts 'I am in Parent class'
  end
end

class B < A
  def initialize()
   super
   puts 'I am in Child class'
  end
end

b = B.new #=>
I am in Parent class
I am in Child class

B.new('a') #=>
`initialize': wrong number of arguments (1 for 0) (ArgumentError)

But now if we pass * as an argument in child class initialize method see what happens.

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class A
  def initialize(argument=nil)
    puts "#{argument}"
    puts 'I am in Parent class'
  end
end

class B < A
  def initialize(*)
   super
   puts 'I am in Child class'
  end
end

B.new #=>

I am in Parent class
I am in Child class

B.new('a') #=>

a
I am in Parent class
I am in Child class

You can see passing * as an argument help to send parameters for parent class even though child class doesn’t require those arguments

Note: * is called splat operator in Ruby.

See some sample Rails code which is using *

https://github.com/rails/rails/blob/v4.0.0/railties/lib/rails/commands/server.rb#L40 https://github.com/rack/rack/blob/1.5.2/lib/rack/server.rb#L178

It was new to me so thought to share with you guys. I hope you can get it if you do not know about this already.