From: James Britt <james.britt@...>
Date: 2006-06-22T22:52:09+09:00
Subject: Re: Ruby goodies?

dblack@wobblini.net wrote:
> Hi --
> 
> On Thu, 22 Jun 2006, Roger Johansson wrote:
> 

>>
>> but are there any other areas where ruby really shines, or are all of
>> the goodies related to the abillity to modify things on the fly?
> 
> 
> Definitely the former.  But I can't enumerate things about Ruby that
> you're going to like; you have to try it out, and see whether it
> speaks to you.
> 
> I can, however, enumerate some things that I like :-)
> 
> Perhaps above all, the clean, expressive syntax.  There's relatively
> little punctuation; well-written Ruby code has a sparse look that I,
> and a lot of other people, love, and it manages to be terse without
> being cryptic.  (Badly-written or [Java/C/Perl/...]-like Ruby code,
> does not have these qualities :-)

I see Ruby code as being succinct rather than terse.  Perhaps a minor 
distinction, but in my mind 'terse' has a pejorative quality.

Well-written Ruby code seems to flow more naturally.  The combination of 
open classes and blocks offers remarkable options for expressiveness.

Jamis Buck wrote a very good article[0] on integration testing in Rails 
that nicely shows how one can evolve from good but codey tests to what 
comes close to being executable narratives.


[0] 
http://jamis.jamisbuck.org/articles/2006/03/09/integration-testing-in-rails-1-1

-- 
James Britt

"In physics the truth is rarely perfectly clear, and that is certainly
  universally the case in human affairs. Hence, what is not surrounded by
  uncertainty cannot be the truth."
  - R. Feynman