[ruby-talk:02186] Re: Use 'Learning Perl' to learn Ruby

>From: Clemens Hintze <[e-mail]>
>Reply-To: [e-mail]
>To: [e-mail] (ruby-talk ML)
>Subject: [ruby-talk:02183] Use 'Learning Perl' to learn Ruby
>Date: Mon, 27 Mar 2000 17:49:03 +0200 (CEST)
>
>Dat Nguyen writes:
> > While waiting for the first Ruby book in english by Dave & Andy, I 
>wonder if
> > I can use the book 'Learning Perl' to learn Ruby. That is, I'll try to 
>redo
> > the Perl program in that book in Ruby language.
>
>Hmm, may I pay you my two cent? I think this idea is not the best one
>probably! Whether it is or not depends on the book 'Lerning Perl'. I
>do not know it, so I cannot give you *the* valid advice.
>
>But I guess it does not make too much sense to use this book for
>Ruby. This is because Perl is very different from Ruby. On the first
>glance both languages seems relatively close, but I feel they are
>totally different in reallity. They share some syntax but this is all
>about it!
>
>Very often in such books Perl's context dependencies are used
>strongly. As mentioned in a previous post before, Ruby has not such
>dependencies (at least not very much). So if you take a typical Perl
>script and re-write it in Ruby, it could looks very similar but a
>little bit clumsy, IMHO. This is because Ruby has to code Perl's
>dependencies explicitly.
>
>You could take Perl's code as an example and then re-think and re-write
>the whole in Ruby. But not to let it looks like Perl, but to use all
>advantages of Ruby.
>
>IMO, re-write examples of a book about Python would be a better choice
>for you. Python is, IMHO, much closer to Ruby than Perl.
>
> > Another idea may be even better is to redo the Perl program in the book
> > 'Object-Oriented Perl' in Ruby language.
>
>*This* could be a good idea, IMHO. I also do not know this book, but
>because in a Perl OO program, the main focus should lay on OO and not
>on Perl's context tricks. So perhaps this would be a better idea. You
>would solve OO problems, and Ruby *is* OO. Here, IMO, you could
>discover all the strengths and power of Ruby. And let Perl looks
>clumsy ;-)))
>
> > At least, I'll have some practical exercises to practice Ruby rather 
>than
> > starring at the Ruby manual and wonder what & where those instructions 
>are
> > applicable.
>
>Hmm! This gives me the expression, that you have not all too much
>experience with HL programming, do you! Knowing Perl and Python, I had
>no difficulties to grasp Ruby's all-world features, only the Ruby's own
>ones.

see:
http://www.columbia.edu/kermit/ckscripts.html#oops
and:
http://www.smalltickle.com/

>
>But having not too much experience is not necessarily a bad thing,
>IMHO. You would not be polluted by the other P-languages (P stands
>here for primitive ;-) Only you should show your programs then, to
>give others possibility to correct you, if you have done things too
>un-Ruby-ish.
>
> > Any advice is very much appreciated.
> > Dat
>
>\cle
>
>--
>Clemens Hintze  mailto: [e-mail]

You're too fast, you don't get the idea. Since you don't know both books 
'Learning Perl' & 'Object-Oriented Perl', it's hard to comment on them.
They represent tasks that can be done with scripting language. I refer to 
the tasks themself and not their immplementation in Perl.
But your presence on ruby-talk is very encouraging.

Dat

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