Ryan Leavengood wrote:
Lyndon Samson said:
Hang onto your Original Pickaxe's, they'll be worth a bit soon
Especially when they are signed by the authors like mine is, muwhahahahaha.
Likewise. 
Let's check Sotheby's in London and see what the
going price is. 
Hal
The lion's share of my income comes from work that I do for a Fortune 500
company, and it is all implemented in Ruby. Whether this is important or
not, though, I think is in the eye of the beholder. I do the work on a
contract basis, and provide services on a contract basis, and the companies
that I work for don't seem to care much how their projects are implemented,
so long as they come in on time and on budget, with the feature set
requested. And using Ruby lets me accomplish this in very competetive
timeframes.
Kirk Haines
On Friday 15 July 2005 9:35 am, gregarican wrote:
Hopefully stories like yours where Fortune 1000 companies start to
adopt Ruby will catch on and the domino effect will take place.
Where I work (and I imagine most places), they don't bring developers on a project until *after* the technology decisions have been made. (Well, there was a market evaluation project about 3-4 years ago that made all the decisions.) On my interview with the PM of a greenfield project, I saw on her computer screen in the background completed order forms for the J2EE application server, the database, and have a strong hunch that we'll be tied to a particular framework, too. Given that ordering things takes time, it makes sense to get this done before you have developers, so that they're not twiddling their thumbs, but hey, we might've been able to save them some time and money by suggesting a free platform (Tomcat & Postgres or, gasp, RoR*).
What is it going to take for us to adopt it? My guess: Skunkworks. Some tiny, rogue development team manages to use RoR simply because they're a blip in upper management's radar, and does something really successful (though small) as a result. Then, they go on tour throughout the building, presenting and such. Unfortunately, I'm not working for that tiny, rogue development team.
Devin
*Actually when I've mentioned Ruby at work it's inspired more often a chuckle than a gasp. It's partly because they know how difficult it is to get new technologies (well, new anything) adopted there, but I think it's partly because it sounds like hype to them.** It'd be less of a problem if the bureaucracy was this adversarial system against which the agile development shops would try to push back, but, sadly, the bureaucracy seems to have permeated the culture.
**Well, okay, there are a few that were, however, really interested in it.
In article <1121441618.529649.252080@g14g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>,
Zach Dennis wrote:
> The only thing that will stop Ruby from growing is if people don't use
> ruby. If you use ruby, that is a +1 chance that Ruby will be used at a
> company; small, medium, large or huge later this year.Very true. For larger companies there are typically some PHB's that
look at the current popular technology trends and hop on those
bandwagons. "Let's see...what's the other guy using? Well, if it's good
enough for them we can certainly use it!"
Do remember that some of those conservative voices are not PHBs.
Ofttimes, they are people who have heard this before, many times, and
have had unpleasant surprises. If you are going to try to sell Ruby, or
Java, or anything, you have to know how the sold-to thinks.
I am a very good Java programmer, and have done Hibernate, Cayenne, JSP,
Servlets, WebObjects, and a bunch of other stuff. Every technology I
have seen in the web app space has had testimonials that were frankly
identical to the testimonials for RoR. I was suspicious.
When James Duncan Davidson mentioned how successful Ruby on Rails has
been, I gave it another look. I have found that my conclusions often
agree with his, and he is very bright and very experienced in many of
the same spaces I am, so if he thinks Ruby is good, it has a good shot
at solving my problems too.
I have not tried Ruby for a serious project, but it looks good from the
small toy projects I have tried.
Would I suggest it for my bread and butter clients for a mission
critical app? Not at my current level of understanding. Would I
suggest it for a testbed or POC? Definitely - we would then know how
well Ruby worked with _our_ systems and _our_ needs. That is how MacOS
X got into our toolset some years back, and how MySql got so popular for
us, and why we built a linux cluster with a few hundred boxes in it
almost a decade ago - they all worked well in the test projects, and we
felt it worth the risk to try something new in return for the benefits
the new thing offered.
In answer to the original question - Ruby is not going to lead to as
many jobs as Java right now. It is still probably worth learning, and
using, as you will then know, not guess, but know where it fits in your
toolbox. When someone interviews you for that next job, which might be
a Java or a .NET, or whatever, job, you can bring up Ruby and
intelligently state the costs, the benefits, the risks, and whether
_you_ think it is a good idea.
If the project fits the Ruby strengths, then it just might be the right
tool.
Scott
"gregarican" <greg.kujawa@gmail.com> wrote:
--
Scott Ellsworth
scott@alodar.nospam.com
Java and database consulting for the life sciences
Or a big nod. I've fed my kids for 3 years with Ruby and website/app work.
The work that I have done with the turnaround times that I give would not
have been possible using either Java or any Perl or Python technologies that
were available over that timespan. 'tis why I made the wholehearted jump to
using Ruby from Perl.
Ruby gets a big hug from me.
Kirk Haines
On Friday 05 August 2005 12:31 pm, David A. Black wrote:
Let's give a tiny little nod to Ruby too
anything planned for OOPSLA?
Not on my account, anyway. I'm doing RubyConf and EuroOSCON
back-to-back. Are any other Rubyists going to OOPSLA?
--
David Heinemeier Hansson
http://www.loudthinking.com -- Broadcasting Brain
http://www.basecamphq.com -- Online project management
http://www.backpackit.com -- Personal information manager
http://www.rubyonrails.com -- Web-application framework
Well yes ... kinda.
As a special pre-OOPSLA event, we are planning a special three day Ruby
extravaganza event featuring some of the most well known Ruby personalities
on the net. It's called ... RubyConf.
Ok, I guess its not really *at* OOPSLA. But it is in the same place,
immediately prior to OOPSLA. If you are coming to OOPSLA, its easy to come a
couple days early and take in the Ruby Conference as well.
On Thursday 14 July 2005 07:56 am, Keith Nicholas wrote:
anything planned for OOPSLA?
--
-- Jim Weirich jim@weirichhouse.org http://onestepback.org
-----------------------------------------------------------------
"Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct,
not tried it." -- Donald Knuth (in a memo to Peter van Emde Boas)
mathew wrote:
Alan Garrison wrote:
Hey, who wants to start a COBOL on Rails project?
Wait until they finish Apache's mod_cobol first.
And wouldn't it be "COBOL via Canals"?
Worse: COBOL in caves.
mathew wrote:
Alan Garrison wrote:
Hey, who wants to start a COBOL on Rails project?
Wait until they finish Apache's mod_cobol first.
And wouldn't it be "COBOL via Canals"?
Forget COBOL entirely... there's an OOP variant
out there now!
It's called ADD 1 TO COBOL...
Hal
*Actually when I've mentioned Ruby at work it's inspired more often a
chuckle than a gasp. It's partly because they know how difficult it is
to get new technologies (well, new anything) adopted there, but I think
it's partly because it sounds like hype to them.**
I'd have to say that all the "RoR 10x faster than Java" articles are
really giving rails a bit of a bad name. Around here, RoR is somewhat
of a joke, just because of all these claims of whiter teeth, bigger
smiles, cleaner floors, etc, that Rails will bring. It just makes the
whole framework seem like an enourmous marketing effort, which to many
technical people indicates a lack of quality. I'm sure that if we
gave Rails a try here, it would be quickly accepted, but breaking
through the cynicism is really hard when a product is being so heavily
hyped.
Hell I don't care if anyone else uses Ruby, I like using it so much
that I would be happy to just keep using it until I found something
that I liked even better.
I signed up to the Ruby mailing lists 2 days ago and they are just
jumping, I really think Ruby (and RoR also) are going to make it big.
Even if they don't I'm happy, I like what I got.
ps. I started to learn programming in college with Java, after year
one I decided not to be a programmer it was so bad, then Ruby changed
my mind.
--
My Blog: http://27degrees.blogspot.org
Well thats just excellent
On 7/15/05, Jim Weirich <jim@weirichhouse.org> wrote:
On Thursday 14 July 2005 07:56 am, Keith Nicholas wrote:
> anything planned for OOPSLA?Well yes ... kinda.
As a special pre-OOPSLA event, we are planning a special three day Ruby
extravaganza event featuring some of the most well known Ruby personalities
on the net. It's called ... RubyConf.Ok, I guess its not really *at* OOPSLA. But it is in the same place,
immediately prior to OOPSLA. If you are coming to OOPSLA, its easy to come a
couple days early and take in the Ruby Conference as well.--
-- Jim Weirich jim@weirichhouse.org http://onestepback.org
-----------------------------------------------------------------
"Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct,
not tried it." -- Donald Knuth (in a memo to Peter van Emde Boas)
Hal Fulton wrote:
It's called ADD 1 TO COBOL...
ADD 1 TO COBOL GIVING COBOL.
*shuddergiggle*
-dB
--
David Brady
ruby-talk@shinybit.com
I'm having a really surreal day... OR AM I?
Hal Fulton wrote:
Forget COBOL entirely... there's an OOP variant
out there now!It's called ADD 1 TO COBOL...
Truth is stranger than fiction:
INVOKE OBJ FOO USING PARM RETURNING ANS
<URL:http://www.objs.com/x3h7/oocobol.htm>
mathew
I'd have to say that all the "RoR 10x faster than Java" articles are
really giving rails a bit of a bad name. Around here, RoR is somewhat
of a joke, just because of all these claims of whiter teeth, bigger
smiles, cleaner floors, etc, that Rails will bring. It just makes the
whole framework seem like an enourmous marketing effort, which to many
technical people indicates a lack of quality. I'm sure that if we
gave Rails a try here, it would be quickly accepted, but breaking
through the cynicism is really hard when a product is being so heavily
hyped.
There's no doubt that breaking through the awareness barrier leaves a
residue of backlash with some. I wrote about this subject and some of
the ecosystem numbers at http://www.loudthinking.com/arc/000484.html
--
David Heinemeier Hansson
http://www.loudthinking.com -- Broadcasting Brain
http://www.basecamphq.com -- Online project management
http://www.backpackit.com -- Personal information manager
http://www.rubyonrails.com -- Web-application framework
This is something of a mixed bag. Rails has been marketed very heavily, true.
The name is all over the place, and has been for quite a while, and many of
the claims, taken individually, are quite open to attack and criticism.
However, at the same time, hasn't that marketing also worked quite
successfully?
If RoR had not been hyped like this, would your Java shop know about it at
all? Would there be an enthusiastic crowd developing for it, and a much
larger enthusiastic crowd buying books about it and using it?
Probably not.
So, although there is a _definite_ negative side to DHH's marketing style, and
it definitely turns some segment of the audience off, I can't sit here as an
observer and conclude that the style is anything but a success for him.
Kirk Haines
On Monday 18 July 2005 7:41 am, tsuraan wrote:
I'd have to say that all the "RoR 10x faster than Java" articles are
really giving rails a bit of a bad name. Around here, RoR is somewhat
of a joke, just because of all these claims of whiter teeth, bigger
smiles, cleaner floors, etc, that Rails will bring. It just makes the
whole framework seem like an enourmous marketing effort, which to many
technical people indicates a lack of quality. I'm sure that if we
gave Rails a try here, it would be quickly accepted, but breaking
through the cynicism is really hard when a product is being so heavily
hyped.
tsuraan wrote:
but breaking through the cynicism is really hard when a product is being so heavily hyped.
I tend to agree. After doing a couple of projects using Rails I am
getting to really like it and feel that it helps me use my time more
productively. But I must say honestly I don't think it's 100% ready for
prime time in terms of larger scale deployments. In my opinion I think
it needs another year or so of development and usage under its belt.
It's like if I was going to pitch Linux as the be-all-end-all back when
I first started using it back in 1997 at the 2.0.34 kernel level. With
the distro packages available for it at the time it's not like I was
going to throw a new mySQL database out there for heavy CRUD
transactional loads and end up replacing our Oracle 7.3 server. Give it
time.
Now Ruby, on the other hand, is definitely ready for prime time. That's
why I love seeing it catch on and folks getting to appreciate all it
delivers...
James McCarthy wrote:
Hell I don't care if anyone else uses Ruby, I like using it so much
that I would be happy to just keep using it until I found something
that I liked even better.I signed up to the Ruby mailing lists 2 days ago and they are just
jumping, I really think Ruby (and RoR also) are going to make it big.Even if they don't I'm happy, I like what I got.
ps. I started to learn programming in college with Java, after year
one I decided not to be a programmer it was so bad, then Ruby changed
my mind.
Good thing you weren't in school when C++ was the language de jour -- you might have needed therapy to recover! 
Curt
This is something of a mixed bag. Rails has been marketed very heavily, true.
The name is all over the place, and has been for quite a while, and many of
the claims, taken individually, are quite open to attack and criticism.
However, at the same time, hasn't that marketing also worked quite
successfully?
Getting the word out is definitely good, and perhaps having some
controversy over the thing does help, but it seems to be raising the
barrier to acceptance. I'd love to see straightforward comparisons
and even some reasonable testimonials, but the gushing is just getting
silly. I don't blame the Rails people for this; I think it's just
some people who really do believe that they've found the holy grail
and are very excited about that. It just makes it a bit difficult to
take rails seriously.
If RoR had not been hyped like this, would your Java shop know about it at
all? Would there be an enthusiastic crowd developing for it, and a much
larger enthusiastic crowd buying books about it and using it?
Not a Java shop (thank god
Probably not.
I've been on the Ruby list since before Rails was released (as far as
I know), so I probably would know about it, but I do get the point.
The news articles certainly are bringing people in, it seems.
Compared to what? There are certainly quite a few vocal advocates
for Rails but the hype/buzz/interest seems to be of a different
quality than the type of "heavy marketing" that is usually associated with
large corporate PR departments. It seems to me more of a grass-roots
buzz to me than any sort of orchestrated campaign. I'd expect
David and company to be advocating their technology but I think there is
more going on than that.
Once I see RoR mentioned in Business Week, I'll consider it being
"heavily marketed".
Gary Wright
On Jul 18, 2005, at 11:03 AM, Kirk Haines wrote:
This is something of a mixed bag. Rails has been marketed very heavily, true.