From: Gavin Sinclair <gsinclair@...>
Date: 2004-09-14T12:56:50+09:00
Subject: Re: Perl to Ruby

> James Edward Gray II wrote:
>
>> On Sep 13, 2004, at 7:49 PM, Arich Chanachai wrote:
>>
>>> Also looking for a Perl to Ruby conversion utility.
>>
>>
>> You have a lot of questions about language cross-over.  What is it you
>>  are looking for exactly?  Perhaps we can provide better information
>> if  we understand what you're looking to do.
>>
>> James Edward Gray II
>>
>>
>>
> I need speed comparable to that of the .NET framework with a dynamic
> language such Ruby or Python.  So far I see .NET/Mono and Java as the
> only JIT frameworks, at least worth looking at.  I need to maintain the
> libraries of Python or Ruby in this cross-over however, and I do not
> know if such implementations have been created.  I am aware PyCs is in
> development for .NET/Mono and Jython for Java. I am looking for a
> similar implementation of Ruby.  It seems that JRuby does not compile to
>  Java bytecode and Jython does not match pure Java code in speed.  I
> have  read that alot of Jython code is still interpreted and is thus
> "10x  slower" than a Java implementation.
>
> Someone suggested that JRuby could be layed onto Groovy to take
> advantage of Groovy's bytecode compilation.  Anyone here know anything
> about the feasibility of this or whether this would achieve the speed I
> desire?  I couldn't find anywhere on the Groovy website what the speed
> comparability was between it and pure Java, but perhaps I am blind.
>
> Thanks all.

Sorry I can't help with the specifics, but my general advice is this: all
the projects you mention are immature, with the possible exception of
JPython.  So I wouldn't accept any general statements about their
performance -- the figures would already be out of date.  I don't even
recall any discussion on this list about their performance over the last
couple of years.

Summary: you'll have to test them out yourself, which shouldn't be too
hard, since Jython, JRuby, and Groovy are all demonstrated in those IBM
articles.

The most mature of those projects is Jython, I suspect, so that's likely
to be your best bet, given your requirements.

Cheers,
Gavin