Rails - May 2007 - When to use self[:foo] in models

I''ve always been a little unclear on accessing attributes of an
ActiveRecord
model within the class itself, i.e.

def full_name
  "#{first_name} #{last_name}"
end

or

def full_name
   "#{self[:first_name]} #{self[:last_name]}"
end

This is a contrieved example and I think both work, but I''ve found
other
times where doing something similar doesn''t work without the self[:]. 
Can
someone shed some light on what the difference is?

Thanks!

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> This is a contrieved example and I think both work, but I''ve found
other
> times where doing something similar doesn''t work without the
self[:].  Can
> someone shed some light on what the difference is?
I think it''s preferable to use the methods rather than the hash
interface. The only situation I''ve come across where you cannot use
the method is single-table inheritance, where you have to use
self[:type] instead of type because type is a built-in (though
deprecated) method.

- Mark.


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