RE: Ruby and .NET

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Sean Middleditch [mailto:[e-mail]]
> Sent: Monday, February 18, 2002 12:07 PM
> To: ruby-talk ML
> Subject: Re: Ruby and .NET
>
>
> On Mon, 2002-02-18 at 11:59, Tobias Reif wrote:
> > Sean Middleditch wrote:
> >
> >
> > > THat is, of course, assuming .NET takes off (which I expect).  SImply
> > > said, the new comers to programming would then only care about .NET
> > > compatible languages.  They would have no reason to pick Ruby over
> > > another language in that case.
> >
> >
> > > If .NET doesn't take off, or doesn't have the impact I expect it to,
> > > then yes, RUby probably will survive just fine as is, if perhaps near
> >
> >  > non-existant on MS platforms.
> >
> >
> > > Tying Ruby into .NET would be useful, on both the MS and Mono sides.
> >
> > Ruby is strong. The language as such doesn't have change for any M$
> > bandwagon, and it shouldn't.
> >
> > Any .NET/Ruby projects that allow Ruby to interface with .NET/Mono or
> > the other way round should be cool.
> >
> > But Ruby should not depend on any M$ tech (like .NET/Mono), or change
> > for it.
>
> Well, face it - if Microsoft OS's become *totally* dependent on .NET
> technology, Ruby will not be used on that platform with .NET
> compatibility.

Well...a point of clarification is in order.  Microsoft is developing
services around .NET to be sure, and they will be building apps and
frameworks on .NET (ASP.NET, etc), but they are NOT rewriting the millions
of lines of C/C++ code for MS Office, MS Windows and all the other existing
MS apps in C#...they are bridging those technologies into the .NET platform
(via that SOAP hack you talk about or via .NETs managed code capability).

Trust me, I talked to someone who works in the MS Office application
unit...they _ARE NOT_ rewriting office in C#.  There is an MS unit that has
built productivity apps based in C#, but I bet you never see them ;)

Ruby is a language who's execution engine is in C...and can be bound into
.NET in similar ways that the Ruby WIN32OLE library connects you to COM and
OLE (remember COM and OLE...those are the other technologies that preceded
.NET that were going to revolutionize the way everyone would write code ;)

BTW: I'm an advocate of using Ruby to seamlessly integrate with the Windows
platform...and I wish we did a better job of that (native threading, etc)
but you don't have to do this by rewriting Ruby in C# and having it
compile/run in bytecode.  One of the things that attracted me to Ruby (from
Java) was the simplicity of dropping into C to link to existing libraries
(or speed up specific routines).  You would lose that simplicity if Ruby was
on Java or C#.

>
> This is the path MS wants, and the one they are likely to get.  Unless a
> *really* big problem unforeseen by anyone working on a .NET
> implementation arises that makes .NET unusable, MS *will* get .NET put
> everywhere they can.  Playing with them and 90% of the world, will
> require .NET.
>
> Or some really ugly SOAP hacks... ~,^

Microsoft released a Web Services toolkit about 2 months ago that allows you
to call SOAP/WSDL/UDDI from MS Office to get to .NET services from Word,
Excel, etc.  I don't think they view this as a hack...its the point!

<RANT>
The main purpose (as far as I can see) of building .NET apps is a
next-generation (and MS controlled) (Java) applets/servlets architecture.
That's what WinForms and ASP.NET is all about.  Microsoft _NEEDS_ the PC to
remain important and have complex code execute on top of it.  They want to
kill off J2EE (and Java).  The browser makes the PC into a glorified
3270/VT-100 terminal that can be served from any server to any client.  Now,
if you use IE specific features (HTML/plugins) that still ties you to using
Windows (or Mac) but it does not really leverage the capabilities of the PC.
Microsoft developed .NET to hook people into writing apps that make strong
use of the PC AND the Server (again...like
applets/servlets...next-generation).  Their main motivation is to maintain
their desktop OS dominance and conquer the middle tiered services
(WebLogic/J2EE/etc) market.
</RANT>

-Rich