Ruby Impressions

[Todd Gillespie]

Phil Tomson <ptkwt at shell1.aracnet.com> wrote:
: In article <f3baf765.0201100904.2049cd96 at posting.google.com>,
: IB <borovik at hotmail.com> wrote:
:>
:>4. Must be easily extendable and imbeddable. (Then it must have a good
:>selection of books on it. Otherwise you have to supply general
:>documentation on the language with every application where you imbed
:>it.)
:>

: Extensions: It is very easy to extend Ruby with C (and it even works with 
: the Garbage collection :)

: Embedability: While I've written Ruby C extensions, I have not embedded 
: Ruby in another application - though I'm told it's quite easy.

I have embedded Ruby in other applications, and have found it to be
absurdly easy.  Too easy in fact, the kind of easy that makes you
suspicious of a secret plot forming around you.  Oh wait -- I'm not in an
action movie.  Never mind.  But embedding Ruby is still easy.

I have tried to embed Python, but have thus far failed to succeed.

Of course I have many complaints with the runtimes of both
languages.  That is for another discussion; I only wished to point out
validity.

: Books:
: There are currently four English language books on Ruby (I'm told that 
: there are something like 15 in Japanese!):

There are also books without number on COBOL, Visual Basic, and
C++.  Number speaks for neither quality of text nor quality of language,
and the original poster should learn this fact.

:>5. Applications must be rather easy to distribute.

: How do you define 'easy to distribute'?  Actually, the RubyGems project is 
: addressing  this.

I think he was asking for 'tar -cfz', TCP/IP, and HTTP GET.

:>6. Must support OOP with possibility to mix it with functional
:>programming.
:>
: Ruby is very a very OO language, comparable to SmallTalk.  It also 
: supports some functional programming styles.

Ruby feels more OO to me than Python.  But since OO is a moving target,
it's hardly suprising that everyone has their own personal answer to #6.

:>item - its syntax. (Actually, I had another item on the list - the
:>language should be rather common to 3D graphics community. I believe
:>Python is unsurpassed here. Just to name few examples - Blender,
:>PoserPro and trueSpace use Python. VTK has bindings for Python.)

That sounds like a winner on that alone, and the rest of the list is
essentially irrelevant.  Use what's useful in your niche.

:>I have not look into Ruby, though. I thought it is just Yet Another
:>Programming Language. It would be interesting to see how items 1-7
:>apply to Ruby and see how Ruby does in comparison to Python and Perl.
:>I would appreciate if someone will continue the thread with a follow
:>up on this.

: short, dRuby convinced me to try Ruby, but the more I programmed in  Ruby 
: the more I really liked it - it just seems to 'make sense'.

I'm not going to edge around it -- Ruby still has some problems,
primarily in its runtime.  The interpreter has some distance to grow.  But
that a language that has had such small support in the past, is the
youngest of the three, has an interpreter on par with Perl 5.001, and
yet is inspiring and useful to so many people piques my interest.  That
development is accelerating raises my interest higher.

If you're a Pythonista, I don't think anyone has said anything against
Python.  Don't devote all your Usenet time to trying to condemn or
exonerate Ruby.  But stop by once in a while -- you might like what crops
up.

HTH.