From: Charles Oliver Nutter <charles.nutter@...>
Date: 2008-06-08T16:44:21+09:00
Subject: Re: Desktop multi-plataform ruby app

Victor Reyes wrote:
> Can JRuby coexist with C-Ruby?

Yes, and you can have any number of entirely separate JRuby installs or 
a single one you use. It's up to you. The JRuby install process is 
essentially "1. unpack, 2. run" provided you have a compliant JVM 
installed (almost all OSes have free and Free compliant JVMs available now).

> Does anyone have any performance numbers of Ruby vs JRuby?

Should be as good, but let us know if not.

> Would any JRuby appl with GUI run on any *NIX server that supports Java?

Java is Java wherever you go, so the same GUI will basically work as-is 
on any *NIX. For a non-GUI example, we have people running Rails + weird 
database access on systems like AS/400 and HP/UX.

> Is there a drag and drop widgets creation GUI design under JRuby with Swing?

Matisse does the drag-and-drop and MonkeyBars makes it all Ruby-nice.

> Currently I am running Ruby 1.8.7 and on some servers I am playing 1.9. What
> is the equivalent version of JRuby to the latest level of Ruby?

Almost nobody is asking for 1.9 features, so we've only taken a marginal 
interest. If people want those features, it wouldn't take more than a 
couple dedicated weeks to get them in.

> How far behind is JRuby from Ruby (C-Ruby)?

Not far behind at all...most normal pure-Ruby code should "just work". 
The places we find bugs these days are in our Java integration layer (up 
for a rewrite this summer) or where you interact with system-level 
resources (IO and process control are especially twitchy). But if you're 
not doing anything that wouldn't have portability challenges under 
normal Ruby, it will probably work great in JRuby too.

- Charlie