From: umptious@... (JC)
Date: 2005-02-14T07:14:56+09:00
Subject: Ruby on Windows: debugger questions and comments

'm evaluating scripting languages for a client. Ruby as a language
seems immediately likeable (I love the Smalltalk influence) but the
tools and their documentation seem likely to cause big problems for
Windows users. (Thelanguage docs otoh are exemplary.) In particular:

1. It seems that the debugger built into FreeRIDE doesn't work under
Windows? If this is true, why on earth doesn't the debugger pop a
dialog box saying this when you try to use it??? Leaving around a
broken debugger without any warning to users in a development
environment makes Ruby look so bad compared to the standard Python and
Perl distributions. A few minutes effort would at least stop Ruby from
looking unreliable.

2. Could someone tell me where I could find documentation on the debug
mode for the interpreter? Its use might be self-evident to people who
have to use GDB type tools every day, but for those of who don't still
use use the Pony Express a page or two of docs would help.

3. Can anyone recommend another Ruby debugger? I've briefly tried
Arachno (bizarrely it doesn't seem to show the value of variables) -
is there anything else?

Thanks.