Weird backslash substitution in Ruby

Question

I don\'t understand this Ruby code:

>> puts \'\\\\ <- single backslash\'
# \\ <- single backslash

>> puts \'\\\\ <- 2x a, because 2 bac         


        

Answer 1

the pickaxe book mentions this exact problem, actually. here's another alternative (from page 130 of the latest edition)

str = 'a\b\c'               # => "a\b\c"
str.gsub(/\\/) { '\\\\' }   # => "a\\b\\c"