Ruby Weekly News: 02/03/2003
A summary of activity on the ruby-talk mailing list, brought to you
this week by Bruce Williams.
ANNOUNCEMENTS
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FXRuby-1.0.1
Lyle Johnson has once again released a new version of the
popular Ruby interface to the FOX toolkit, FXRuby. In addition
to the usual assortment of bug fixes and other changes, this
release includes the “preview” API documentation in RDoc style.
Check out FXRuby-1.0.18([1]).
cLabs IEController
Chris Morris released cLabs IEController, a helper library for
doing acceptance testing by driving Internet Explorer. The
library also includes the beginnings of support for .Net
Windows Forms. Get cLabs IEController([2]).
Borges
Eric Hodel has released Borges 0.1.0, a web application
framework based on Seaside 2.0 by Avi Bryant (of IOWA fame).
Borges is a web application framework that allows linear
programming of web applications and runs on Webrick (Apache+DRb
will be supported in the near future) and features a simple
rendering interface.
Some of you may recognize this project from RubyConf 2002...
well, Eric has taken over as maintainer of the Ruby port and
has already done some fantastic work. Check out Borges([3]).
Webplayer
In another release, Eric Hodel brings us Webplayer 0.1.0, is a
Web-based MP3 player featuring the ability to load a playlist
(.m3u), a directory of .mp3 files (non-recursively), or a
single .mp3 file. Take a look at Webplayer([4]).
RAA.succ!
The Ruby Application Archive has now reached version 2.3.0
thanks to the efforts of U. Nakamura, the RAA development team,
and many comments and suggestions from the Ruby community.
Changes include a move to a new location, improved
categorization, and numerous layout and design modifications
for improved navigation. Visit the new and improved Ruby
Application Archive([5])
The Ruby Way in Japanese
Hal Fulton, author of The Ruby Way, recently announced that as
of December 2002, the book has been translated into Japanese
and has started distribution in Japan via a publisher,
Shoeisha. Hal gave thanks to a number of people within the
community that helped this effort take place, and would like
any feedback the community may have on any “interesting” or
“unusual” issues in translation. Get your copy at Amazon([6])
or directly from the publisher([7]).
INTERESTING THREADS
OSCON Presentations
A post submitted by Chad Fowler seeking information on
proposals for Ruby talks and tutorials at OSCON resulted in a
response outlining several submissions by Phil Thomson. An
interesting sub-thread bringing to light the issue of
conference costs and what we can do as a community to aid Matz
in making use of opportunities like this, perhaps through the
umbrella non-profit organization for the conference, Ruby
Central, Inc.
Ruby Books
A question by Mark Probert about the book market for
Ruby-related books quickly became a popular thread centered
around the general decrease in [technical] book sales and the
challenges that exist for Ruby in this important market. Matz
made in especially interesting post([8]) detailing the number
of Ruby books currently available in print.
Test::Unit order of tests
An interesting topic of concern to many this week centered
around the ability to order unit tests, the methods in which
this can be accomplished, and balancing good testing practices
with practical needs. Many good ideas and novel approaches can
be found in this thread for the XP enthusiast.
Local variables and blocks
Once again the topic of variable scope comes to the forefront.
This lengthy and informative thread contains a large amount of
suggestions and comments by various members of the community as
how to best approach the issue of variable scoping, and
numerous explanations of how it will behave in the future.
References
1.
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=20243;release_id=136352
2. http://clabs.org/scrpware.htm
3. http://segment7.net/ruby-code/borges/borges.html
4. http://segment7.net/ruby-code/webplayer/webplayer.html
5. http://raa.ruby-lang.org/
6.
http://www.amazon.co.jp/exec/obidos/ASIN/4798102288/ref=sr_aps_b_/249-505150
7. http://www.shoeisha.com/book/Detail.asp?bid=1475;tk=ruby
8. http://www.ruby-talk.org/63126