Jim Clark
2/16/2007 4:55:00 AM
jazzy wrote:
> I have a visual basic 6 program I made which stores databases and
> allows the user to input data and get calculations from day to day. It
> uses dao. There a many different windows that come up to input various
> preferences and data calculations.
>
> Can I build such a program with Ruby or is Ruby more for dos based
> systems or for only web development?
>
Yes you can build such a system. In the same way that Visual Basic is
used in many different settings (stand alone programs, VB Script, web
site back ends, etc.), Ruby can do these same things. There are GUI
toolkits for Ruby (Tk, Fox / FXRuby, wxRuby, GTK, and Qt to name a few)
for stand alone development, database drivers to connect with whatever
database you prefer, frameworks like Rails for web development, and a
large variety of well tested libraries / gems that can be used to speed
development on all kinds of projects. In addition, since everything is
an object in Ruby, you can do some really interesting things that would
take much more effort in VB.
> I guess I just really don't understand what all Ruby is for.
>
Take a look in the archives for this list, and specifically at some of
the Ruby Quizzes, to see how powerful Ruby can be.
HTH,
Jim