How can I save an object to a file?

Question

I would like to save an object to a file, and then read it from the file easily. As a simple example, lets say I have the following 3d array:

m = [[[0, 0, 0]         


        

Answer 1

YAML and Marshal are the most obvious answers, but depending on what you're planning to do with the data, sqlite3 may be a useful option too.

require 'sqlite3'

m = [[[0, 0, 0],
 [0, 0, 0],
 [0, 0, 0]],
[[0, 0, 0],
 [0, 0, 0],
 [0, 0, 0]]]

db=SQLite3::Database.new("demo.out")
db.execute("create table data (x,y,z,value)")
inserter=db.prepare("insert into data (x,y,z,value) values (?,?,?,?)")
m.each_with_index do |twod,z|
  twod.each_with_index do |row,y|
    row.each_with_index do |val,x|
      inserter.execute(x,y,z,val)
    end
  end
end