Page 1 of 2
I've decided... I'm going to learn Ruby
Posted: Fri Jun 15, 2007 3:15 am
by Ollie Saunders
Anyone else learnt it yet? Anyone using it in a project?
Opinions of the Ruby and Rails?
Posted: Fri Jun 15, 2007 3:33 am
by Maugrim_The_Reaper
Ruby as a language is very cool. I've done a few small things with it replacing older Perl scripts and it's weird how utilising OOP for those functions makes it all easier to maintain. Perl is losing my attention at this stage.
Rails is a different animal. There's no doubt it's a great framework but I prefer something less pushy about conventions. I suppose one the biggest pieces of news recently in PHP/Rails is that some large Rails sites have had to start cutting out some of the really neat features and functions to make it scale.
Ruby is certainly worth learning. As a small bonus it's syntax and coding standards while different from PHP/Java tradition (you rarely see camel-casing in Ruby code which I completely hate but can live with) is similar to Python. So you can make a bit of inroads on both by learning Ruby. Python is another cooler than cool language - if you ever get around to it's got a few web application frameworks including Django.
Posted: Fri Jun 15, 2007 3:40 am
by Ollie Saunders
I have written one class is Python it was a command line text formatter thing. I thought it was cool. But for now it's gotta be Ruby all the way.
Rails is a different animal. There's no doubt it's a great framework but I prefer something less pushy about conventions.
Yeah after I made the decision to learn Ruby my second thought was "I'm going to have to write my PHP framework in Ruby". I've grown quite fond of my own framework. Still I should learn the language seriously before I try and attempt such a thing otherwise I'll risk trying to turn Ruby into PHP instead of embracing it's alternate paradigms, which, by the looks of things, there are many

.
it's weird how utilising OOP for those functions makes it all easier to maintain
"Everything is an object" is very much a feature of JavaScript too, and one that I love, so this is really great for me. In fact I've considered getting into ASP before simply because of the fact that you can use JavaScript, well, ECMAScript.
Posted: Fri Jun 15, 2007 8:43 am
by Luke
I've fiddles with RoR a little, and I have to agree with Maugrim, it's a stubborn framework. It's RoR's way or the highway
I'm more interested in learning Python for web development as well as application development. Django is the framework I'd like to learn as well.
Anyway, good luck ole! You inspiring fellow!

Posted: Fri Jun 15, 2007 8:50 am
by infolock
I personally don't like Rails, or Ruby in general. I read through the language and don't feel like I'm a developer anymore. I feel like I'm an HTML kiddie all over again. Don't get me wrong, I'm aware of what all Ruby can do, but as for the language, it's syntax and the famework, I was not impressed at all. But to each his own (=
Posted: Fri Jun 15, 2007 9:45 am
by alimadzi
What turns me off about Rails is that it's an all or nothing framework. It's the Rails way or the highway so to speak. Before you jump off the PHP ship, you should take a look at the Zend Framework:
http://framework.zend.com
It's a very robust MVC framework (similar to Rails) but it allows you to use as much or as little of it as you see fit. Check it out.
Posted: Fri Jun 15, 2007 10:07 am
by Ollie Saunders
Ninja wrote:I've fiddles with RoR a little, and I have to agree with Maugrim, it's a stubborn framework. It's RoR's way or the highway
Hmm OK. I'll bare this in mind. Hopefully I'll love the framework

. I think I'm going to code without the framework for a while first though. Which is why I said I'm going to learn Ruby not RoR.
alimadzi wrote:What turns me off about Rails is that it's an all or nothing framework. It's the Rails way or the highway so to speak.
Is there an echo in here?
I feel like I'm an HTML kiddie all over again.
How do you mean? Is that bad?
Before you jump off the PHP ship, you should take a look at the Zend Framework
I've have, in detail. It's got interesting bits but even the bits that are supposed to unit testable aren't to a great enough extent to me. The whole library is geared towards the individual with a ameateur familiarity with OO and so instead of having flex points it tries to provide everything to all people, the result is bloated, largely irrelevant, slow performing code that I can't easily extend. And then some bits are just completely pants, validation for instance.
Despite saying all this the principles on which the Zend Framework are founded are excellent and as long as they don't get too concerned with backwards compatability and keep improving it'll probably end up the best PHP framework if it isn't already.
Posted: Fri Jun 15, 2007 11:32 am
by Benjamin
What is on your mind? Are you looking for a challenge? Accelerated development? Just think it's cool? I researched it a bit, I don't think it's something I would be interested in.
Posted: Fri Jun 15, 2007 12:52 pm
by dreamscape
I've never played around with RoR much, but Ruby itself I have a few times... the language itself is quite easy to learn, IMO.
I don't have every built in method memorized, obviously, but they are easy enough to look up on the occasion that I play around with Ruby.
Posted: Fri Jun 15, 2007 4:55 pm
by DrTom
Ruby as a language is awesome. I use it at my office for tons of small scripts and tools. Especially when I need to hack together quick interfaces as the GTK or Qt support is both pretty good.
I wouldn't even really consider RoR on high volume site though. The framework just simply does not scale well. Ruby in general as a web language is a bit weird. Even if you don't use Rails, it's way more resource intensive than php or even asp, and once you use Rails, it gets even worse. It's really cool for super quick super small sites where performance is not going to be an issue, but I wouldn't even consider it for a serious project.
Python is pretty much the same boat as Ruby. I've written a few tools in it, and even used DJango for one production site(none of the rails ones ever went production). I love writing stuff with the language, but the scalability on the webside is really lacking.
Posted: Sat Jun 16, 2007 6:22 pm
by Luke
A friend of mine just gave me a copy of
Learning Python yesterday. I guess I don't have any excuse not to learn it now.

Posted: Sun Jun 17, 2007 2:23 am
by Ollie Saunders
astions wrote:What is on your mind? Are you looking for a challenge? Accelerated development? Just think it's cool? I researched it a bit, I don't think it's something I would be interested in.
Well I've certainly become more interested in functional programming, that is cool and could well lead to accelerated development.
Posted: Sun Jun 17, 2007 2:14 pm
by califdon
This has been an interesting and useful thread. I looked at Ruby and RoR, too. I installed it, but never actually used it, for much the same reasons as several contributors here found. I must look into Zend and also Python, though. Thanks to all for the insights.
Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2007 3:32 am
by Ollie Saunders
I spent most of yesterday playing around with Ruby. I dig out my old pascal programs I wrote and wrote them in Ruby. It was cool

. Ruby is actually incredibly easy, I feel like after one day I could quite happily write something of reasonable complexitiy albeit limited to command line interactions. The standard class library is comprehensive and unlike PHP's consistent, very nice.
I must look into Zend and also Python, though. Thanks to all for the insights.
Interestingly, I wanted to learn python also, but now that desire has mostly gone.
Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2007 2:15 pm
by infolock
ole wrote:
I feel like I'm an HTML kiddie all over again.
How do you mean? Is that bad?
Well...do you like development? Do you desire to be in an enviornment that requires you to have understanding of c/c++ - style syntaxes or do you just want to let things work in a basically anti-c-syntax enviornment? Would you like to be able to apply what you learn in a language to other languages (notibly c++, C#, java, etc), or do you not care ?
If you care, then Ruby will not be good for you. If you don't care, then yeah, I guess Ruby would fit you nicely.
This might sound like I'm bashing it, and maybe I am. But it's because I'd rather feel like a developer instead of , well, whatever a Ruby developer feels like when he codes in it (=
[begin_disclaimer]
no offense to any ruby/ror devs out there. Just stating my opinion. my opinion does not mean i'm correct nor does my opinion reflect non-ruy devs.
[end_disclaimer]