From: Peter Szinek <peter@...>
Date: 2006-10-04T16:34:52+09:00
Subject: Re: JRuby scripting for Mozilla?

> Let's not forget Ruby-XPCOM! :-)

There are a few problems with Ruby-XPCOM:
1) It is in a very-very... hmmm... early state, which would not be a 
problem per se, but given that the development stopped more than 5 years 
ago (at least I did not find any sign of life since then (2001-08-12, to 
be punctual)).

JavaXPCOM is actively developed, very stable, robust and fast
(Disclaimer: I absolutely love Ruby and I don't like Java that much at 
all, so I am not telling this because I am a Java fanboy (quite the 
contrary), but because that's the truth). We have built a commercial 
product used by really big companies based on JavaXPCOM and it (so far) 
works.

2) Let's forget about 1) - let's even say it is perfectly solved. Now, 
to do something meaningful, you need a serious GUI which you can 
manipulate with rbXPCOM. In Java's case this is XULRunner - In Ruby's 
case it is GTKMozembed ( http://raa.ruby-lang.org/project/gtkmozembed/ )
- anybody knows about anything else? - which is just not there yet (at 
least as I understood after talking to the author)

I'd be the happiest person on the earth if somebody could prove me 
wrong, and the same thing would be possible from Ruby that is now 
possible from Java. OK, I did my research a few months ago so it is 
possible that somebody created a solution by now...

Peter
http://www.rubyrailways.com