.nil? .empty? .blank? .present? in Ruby on Rails

We get confused when there are many options to choose from. Same is the case when it comes to use any one from the above list. But one needs to be careful in using them and it is better that we understand it well before using it.

Let's see which method does what.

.nil?

- It is Ruby method
- It can be used on any object and is true if the object is nil.
- "Only the object nil responds true to nil?" - RailsAPI

nil.nil? = true
anthing_else.nil? = false
a = nil
a.nil? = true
“”.nil = false

.empty?

- It is Ruby method
- can be used on strings, arrays and hashes and returns true if:
String length == 0
Array length == 0
Hash length == 0
- Running .empty? on something that is nil will throw a NoMethodError

"".empty = true
" ".empty? = false


.blank?

- It is Rails method
- operate on any object as well as work like .empty? on strings, arrays and hashes.

nil.blank? = true 
[].blank? = true 
{}.blank? = true 
"".blank? = true 
5.blank? == false

- It also evaluates true on strings which are non-empty but contain only whitespace:

"  ".blank? == true"  ".empty? == false

Quick tip: !obj.blank? == obj.present?

activesupport/lib/active_support/core_ext/object/blank.rb, line 17 # (Ruby 1.9) 

def present? 
 !blank?
end