From: Henrik Martensson Date: 2006-01-08T18:54:15+09:00 Subject: Re: Ideas on "Why Living Dangerous can be A Good Thing" in Ruby? On Sun, 2006-01-08 at 08:44, Gregory Brown wrote: > On 1/8/06, Eero Saynatkari wrote: > > > If one were inclined to actually argue a point, one might mention some > > of C++'s vulnerabilities: buffer overflows, pointers, memory handling > > and so on. > > This is a good point. In languages like C++, your security can really > go to hell through improper memory management. This is much less > likely to happen in Ruby. It is a good point when comparing Ruby and C++, but it is unlikely to impress Java programmers. I believe it will be a better strategy to argue the strengths of Ruby, rather than the weaknesses of other languages. For example, on the Java side, there are frameworks who aim to make software designs more loosely coupled, for example IoC frameworks, AOP extensions, etc. These frameworks emulate a dynamic approach to software development. Some of these, like Spring, are very good. Nevertheless, learning those frameworks requires a considerable investment in time and effort. The proliferation of different frameworks makes it hard to get by knowing just one or two. (One thing that maybe shouldn't be brought up is that often corporate policies, rather than technical considerations, dictate which framework gets used. For example, many companies use EJB and various EJB frameworks even though it is not appropriate for the development they do.) Ruby, as we know, has many AOP features built in. The dynamic typing removes the need for complex interface based designs. More important, the Ruby features are easy to learn, easy to use, and because they are built-in, they don't run the risk of being prohibited by corporate policies. /Henrik -- http://www.henrikmartensson.org/ - Reflections on software development