Ruby Underscore

I was browsing through the source code for Unicorn when I noticed this piece of code

mapping.each { |hostname,_,_,_| hostnames[hostname] = true }

The underscores caught my attention. Based on my experience with other programming languages, I assumed the underscore was there for unused variables.

According to Ruby syntax, a variable can be given the identifier _. Unlike regular identifiers, however, the Ruby parser only allows the _ identifier to be duplicated. If you try an identifier like foo, a SyntaxError will be raised.