# An Object is really a hash like structure. It is dynamic and # you want to store values by name (instance variable names). # # One could (like mri), store the names in each object, but that is wasteful # Instead we store only the values, and access them by index. # The Layout allows the mapping of names to index. # The Layout of an object describes the memory layout of the object # The Layout is a simple list of the names of instance variables. # # As every object has a Layout to describe it, the name "layout" is the # first name in the list for every Layout. # But as we want every Object to have a class, this is the second # entry in the list. The name for the entry is "object_class" # In other words, the Layout is a list of names that describe # the values stored in an actual object. # The object is an List of values of length n and # the Layout is an List of names of length n # Together they turn the object into a hash like structure module Parfait class Layout < List end end