From: "David A. Black" Date: 2009-01-09T22:24:43+09:00 Subject: Re: How Ruby Hi -- On Fri, 9 Jan 2009, Mike Stephens wrote: > My view is you start out simple and straightforward. There are no Police > to arrest you if you write procedural Ruby programs. I have many Ruby > books and the impression I get is it is a complex, subtle and somewhat > arcane language. I have no intention of ever learning reflection and > that sort of thing. My long experience of IT tells me that code is a > tiny part of solving problems and that clever code is rarely preferable > to something simple and easy to understand. What I also want to avoid - > like you - is having to learn lots of things at once so my advice is > start off with raw Ruby out of the box, and only add layers as you > become comfortable with what you've already learnt. You're not in this > game to talk to clever people at conferences. You're here to build > systems that work. At the same time, keep in mind that Ruby is optimized for programmer enjoyment, so it in fact tries not to be arcane (though it's not without a learning curve, of course). Also, things like reflection and other so-called "metaprogramming" techniques in Ruby actually arise very naturally from the basic object model and the basic idioms of the language. It's all cut from the same cloth, which is one of the things that make it fun and interesting.[1] Lots of people who build systems that work also come to conferences, where they enjoy the company and stimulation of their friends and colleagues who have been working on other projects and have interesting insights to share. I've co-organized around twenty Ruby-related conferences, and attended quite a few others, and it's been an on-going highlight of my experience as a Rubyist. In short, I wouldn't look at either the Ruby language or the Ruby world as a minefield of clever but shallow features and/or people. In my 8+ years of experience with it, it's anything but. David [1] http://dablog.rubypal.com/2007/1/7/meta-shmeta-learning-ruby-horizontally -- David A. Black / Ruby Power and Light, LLC Ruby/Rails consulting & training: http://www.rubypal.com Coming in 2009: The Well-Grounded Rubyist (http://manning.com/black2) http://www.wishsight.com => Independent, social wishlist management!