Ruby Array#to_hash

The number of times I've had to convert an array to a hash is amazing. And the sad thing is that the standard Ruby array doesn't have any simple way to do it! This is probably because there are a lot of ways you can convert an array to a hash.

Here's the way I do it a lot:

hash = Hash[*keys.zip(values).flatten]

This works, unless your values array has nested arrays in which case you're screwed. A better alternative is:

hash = keys.zip(values).inject({}) { |h, nvp| h[nvp[0]] = nvp[1]; h }

This handles nested arrays, but it makes Ruby elegance freaks cry. But that's not my problem, so let's go like this:

class Array
  def to_hash
    self.inject({}) { |h, nvp| h[nvp[0]] = nvp[1]; h }
  end
end

Assuming that the array is in name-value pair format, this should work fine. So you have:

[ [:a, 5], [:b, "hello"] ].to_hash   # => {:a => 5, :b => "hello" }

There are probably problems with this, if you know of any please comment!