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comp.lang.ruby

Getting Ruby approved

Joe Van Dyk

4/1/2005 2:46:00 AM

Hi,

I'm trying to get Ruby added to one of the "supported" OSS tools at Boeing.

I was asked this question: "The question is, is Ruby bringing
something extra to the table, that we can't do with Perl, Python, Tcl,
Guile? E.g., are there OSS packages that we want to use which need
Ruby?"

I mentioned Rails and DRb as being the most useful applications of
Ruby to me. But can someone help me out with more?

Thanks,
Joe Van Dyk
47 Answers

Hal E. Fulton

4/1/2005 2:56:00 AM

0

Joe Van Dyk wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I'm trying to get Ruby added to one of the "supported" OSS tools at Boeing.
>
> I was asked this question: "The question is, is Ruby bringing
> something extra to the table, that we can't do with Perl, Python, Tcl,
> Guile? E.g., are there OSS packages that we want to use which need
> Ruby?"
>
> I mentioned Rails and DRb as being the most useful applications of
> Ruby to me. But can someone help me out with more?

On the one hand, all Turing-complete languages are equivalent.

In a more practical vein, sometimes there are libraries/packages
with which you need to interface, making some language a more
natural choice than others.

Neither of these points sells Ruby. What sells Ruby is the
productivity that programmers have when they use it.

This is only my opinion: I don't consider Perl as being on a level
with Ruby in this respect, and Tcl is not even close. Python, I
think, is very similar to Ruby in terms of productivity. I am not
familiar with Guile.

In case it helps any, you can refer to my article on devsource.com --
it was written partly to sell the idea that Ruby is now mainstream.


Hal

Pat Maddox

4/1/2005 3:10:00 AM

0

Show them the 10x productivity claims :) If you find anything that
shows that you can increase productivity by three-fold, you'll have no
trouble selling it to them.


On Fri, 1 Apr 2005 11:56:17 +0900, Hal Fulton <hal9000@hypermetrics.com> wrote:
> Joe Van Dyk wrote:
> > Hi,
> >
> > I'm trying to get Ruby added to one of the "supported" OSS tools at Boeing.
> >
> > I was asked this question: "The question is, is Ruby bringing
> > something extra to the table, that we can't do with Perl, Python, Tcl,
> > Guile? E.g., are there OSS packages that we want to use which need
> > Ruby?"
> >
> > I mentioned Rails and DRb as being the most useful applications of
> > Ruby to me. But can someone help me out with more?
>
> On the one hand, all Turing-complete languages are equivalent.
>
> In a more practical vein, sometimes there are libraries/packages
> with which you need to interface, making some language a more
> natural choice than others.
>
> Neither of these points sells Ruby. What sells Ruby is the
> productivity that programmers have when they use it.
>
> This is only my opinion: I don't consider Perl as being on a level
> with Ruby in this respect, and Tcl is not even close. Python, I
> think, is very similar to Ruby in terms of productivity. I am not
> familiar with Guile.
>
> In case it helps any, you can refer to my article on devsource.com --
> it was written partly to sell the idea that Ruby is now mainstream.
>
>
> Hal
>
>

Bill Guindon

4/1/2005 3:12:00 AM

0

On Fri, 1 Apr 2005 11:56:17 +0900, Hal Fulton <hal9000@hypermetrics.com> wrote:
> Joe Van Dyk wrote:
> > Hi,
> >
> > I'm trying to get Ruby added to one of the "supported" OSS tools at Boeing.
> >
> > I was asked this question: "The question is, is Ruby bringing
> > something extra to the table, that we can't do with Perl, Python, Tcl,
> > Guile? E.g., are there OSS packages that we want to use which need
> > Ruby?"
> >
> > I mentioned Rails and DRb as being the most useful applications of
> > Ruby to me. But can someone help me out with more?
>
> On the one hand, all Turing-complete languages are equivalent.
>
> In a more practical vein, sometimes there are libraries/packages
> with which you need to interface, making some language a more
> natural choice than others.
>
> Neither of these points sells Ruby. What sells Ruby is the
> productivity that programmers have when they use it.
>
> This is only my opinion: I don't consider Perl as being on a level
> with Ruby in this respect, and Tcl is not even close. Python, I
> think, is very similar to Ruby in terms of productivity. I am not
> familiar with Guile.
>
> In case it helps any, you can refer to my article on devsource.com --
> it was written partly to sell the idea that Ruby is now mainstream.

To save you the search:
http://www.devsource.com/article2/0,1759,1778...

I'll 2nd Hal's comment, it's the ease of use, and more importantly
"readability" that sold me. Having done quite a bit of perl in the
past, I love Ruby's clean look and the fact that I can read code that
I haven't looked at for a month or more (especially since I only use
it occassionally).

--
Bill Guindon (aka aGorilla)

Robert Klemme

4/1/2005 11:27:00 AM

0


"Joe Van Dyk" <joevandyk@gmail.com> schrieb im Newsbeitrag
news:c715e640503311845762a6cc2@mail.gmail.com...
> Hi,
>
> I'm trying to get Ruby added to one of the "supported" OSS tools at
Boeing.
>
> I was asked this question: "The question is, is Ruby bringing
> something extra to the table, that we can't do with Perl, Python, Tcl,
> Guile? E.g., are there OSS packages that we want to use which need
> Ruby?"
>
> I mentioned Rails and DRb as being the most useful applications of
> Ruby to me. But can someone help me out with more?

Not exactly a package... But reuse is more likely with Ruby than with
Perl simply because in a year from now you'll be still able to read and
understand the code you write today quickly.

Kind regards

robert

Joao Pedrosa

4/1/2005 11:43:00 AM

0

Hi,

On Mar 31, 2005 11:45 PM, Joe Van Dyk <joevandyk@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I'm trying to get Ruby added to one of the "supported" OSS tools at Boeing.
>
> I was asked this question: "The question is, is Ruby bringing
> something extra to the table, that we can't do with Perl, Python, Tcl,
> Guile? E.g., are there OSS packages that we want to use which need
> Ruby?"
>
> I mentioned Rails and DRb as being the most useful applications of
> Ruby to me. But can someone help me out with more?

Ruby has closures, better low level support (Ruby/C), better OO
support, better core developers and better community, along with the
better libraries and overall language. :-) Tell them that they can
dump all the other languages and use only Ruby. :-)

Cheers,
Joao

Adriano Ferreira

4/1/2005 12:28:00 PM

0

On Apr 1, 2005 8:42 AM, Joao Pedrosa <joaopedrosa@gmail.com> wrote:
> Ruby has closures, better low level support (Ruby/C), better OO
> support, better core developers and better community, along with the
> better libraries and overall language. :-) Tell them that they can
> dump all the other languages and use only Ruby. :-)

And you have forgotten about bf or even better Intercal. They are
funnier, more useless, but lays less claims than you did above.

Regards,
Adriano.

P.S. "Thou shall not be arrogant", unless thou want people very far from you.

Adriano Ferreira

4/1/2005 1:05:00 PM

0

On Apr 1, 2005 8:42 AM, Joao Pedrosa <joaopedrosa@gmail.com> wrote:
> Ruby has closures, better low level support (Ruby/C), better OO
> support, better core developers and better community, along with the
> better libraries and overall language. :-) Tell them that they can
> dump all the other languages and use only Ruby. :-)

Sorry for being ironic at first. But it would be better to rephrase
as: "Tell them to give Ruby a try and soon they can dump all the other
languages."

Adriano.

tony summerfelt

4/1/2005 1:42:00 PM

0

On Fri, 1 Apr 2005 11:56:17 +0900, you wrote:


>Neither of these points sells Ruby. What sells Ruby is the
>productivity that programmers have when they use it.

>This is only my opinion: I don't consider Perl as being on a level
>with Ruby in this respect, and Tcl is not even close.

interesting. i see a lot of messages here along the lines of 'which
gui kit should i use with ruby'...and then everyone pipes up with
their favorite...

of course by then in tcl/tk land, we've already finished coding up our
interfaces :)

i had a client tender for a very specific one-time utility. they asked
in house c++ and java programmers, and externally my name came up
because of the local perl work i've done...

when i read the specs for the program they wanted i told them they
could have it in an hour if they didn't care about which language it
was (they were expecting perl from me at that point).

i used tcl/tk...the interface, which needed a certain arraignment of
widgets, took maybe 5 minutes to code up (a RAD tool at this point
would have slowed me down). the rest of the code was trivial.

so the language that was 'not even close' brought me over $1000 in
less than an hour. tcl/tk really is a sleeper language. i'm amazed
that it's not more popular than it is outside of comp.lang.tcl

i'm still deciding on a permanent gui api for ruby :)
http://home.cogeco.ca/~ts...
telnet://ventedspleen.dyndns.org

Lyle Johnson

4/1/2005 2:08:00 PM

0

On Mar 31, 2005 8:45 PM, Joe Van Dyk <joevandyk@gmail.com> wrote:

> I'm trying to get Ruby added to one of the "supported" OSS tools at Boeing.
>
> I was asked this question: "The question is, is Ruby bringing
> something extra to the table, that we can't do with Perl, Python, Tcl,
> Guile? E.g., are there OSS packages that we want to use which need
> Ruby?"
>
> I mentioned Rails and DRb as being the most useful applications of
> Ruby to me. But can someone help me out with more?

Though it's not a direct answer to your question, I tend to agree with
some of the other replies that if you try to "sell" Ruby to your
co-workers (or the higher-ups) by comparing it to other languages'
features and applications, you're fighting a losing battle. I for one
would love to be there when you try to explain to your boss that
Boeing should adopt Ruby because it has closures. ;)

Having said that, if you haven't seen it already, you might want to
take a look at Andy Hunt's presentation on "Ruby Insurgency"
(presented at the first Ruby Conference back in 2001):

http://www.pragmaticprogrammer.com/talks/Ruby/RubyInsurgen...

This is sort-of the approach that I'm using here at work (where most
of our development work is done in Java), in an attempt to introduce
people to Ruby. I use Ruby for a lot of little maintenance tasks
involved in building our code, and when someone asks "How did you do
that?" or, "Can I get a copy of that program?", it gives me an
opportunity to tell them a little bit about Ruby.

Hope this helps,

Lyle

Booker C. Bense

4/1/2005 3:46:00 PM

0

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----

In article <c715e640503311845762a6cc2@mail.gmail.com>,
Joe Van Dyk <joevandyk@gmail.com> wrote:
>Hi,
>
>I'm trying to get Ruby added to one of the "supported" OSS tools at Boeing.
>
>I was asked this question: "The question is, is Ruby bringing
>something extra to the table, that we can't do with Perl, Python, Tcl,
>Guile? E.g., are there OSS packages that we want to use which need
>Ruby?"
>
>I mentioned Rails and DRb as being the most useful applications of
>Ruby to me. But can someone help me out with more?
>

_ For me the biggest productivity gain between ruby and perl is
when you need to write modules to interface with existing
libraries. This is about a 1000 times simpler in Ruby than perl.

_ Booker C. Bense


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