How does Ruby's $LOAD_PATH get affected in other files when changed in one file?

Question

I have the following project directory structure:

.
├── bin
├── lib
│   ├── foo
│   │   ├── bar.rb
│   │   └── baz.rb
│   └── foo.rb
└── test

foo.rb :

require 'foo/bar'

bar.rb :

require 'foo/baz'

baz.rb :

puts "baz"

When I run foo.rb by adding the lib directory to the load path, Ruby prints out:

"baz"

I added the lib directory to the load path in foo.rb . How does it get added to load path in foo/bar.rb as well?

Answer 1

$LOAD_PATH is a global variable shared between all files in a single ruby process. So when one file modifies it, any code executed after the modification will also use the modified version.

You can read more about global variables here

Answer 2

as other pointed out already LOAD_PATH is global. You should not be relying on tricks like this though. In your case the right thing to do is to use require_relative