[ruby-talk:03739] Re: Why it's quiet -- standard distribution issues

Conrad Schneiker <[e-mail]> writes:

> For those of us wanting to try out new or non-standard stuff, this would be
> great. However for reasons involving system administration (site
> configuration standardization, troubleshooting, keeping everyone at the same
> level) in the most widespread and most run-of-the-mill environments, this
> would also have disadvantages. Most users don't have always-on Internet
> connections.

Today maybe. Next year, I suspect the opposite will be true.

> Many people don't want stuff changing behind their back on one
> hand,

I'd see a URL containing a encoded version number. And ig you think
about it, accessing library components by some global identifier is
really the basis of COM, and that seems to be accepted (OK, so maybe
that's not something to aspire to, but at least it is a precedent).

> and on the other hand, many of the same people don't want to be
> dealing with pop-up dialogs asking if it's OK to fetch some random module
> that they are clueless about.

And this would be different from Quickbooks and Microsoft Office in
what way... ;-)

> So while I think dynamic updating will certainly be a nice
> capability to have (especially for products where Ruby is hidden
> away internally), I don't think it will ever mitigate the many
> practical advantages of stuff that is universally available
> out-of-the-box for most people, under most conditions, for a long
> time to come.

Except the static approach has its own set of disadvantages. If
there's a bug, should the naive user have to run a Makefile to install
a newer version? And why should the average user download a heap of
packages that they don't use?

> Such dynamic updating developments are off in the future; and when
> it does come, it may take several versions before it really becomes
> suitable for general use.

Exactly! And for that to happen, we need to be thinking about it now,
talking about it next week, and hacking up some prototype
implementations over the coming months.

This is the kind of novel and useful functionality that, if
implemented intelligently and flexibly, could make Ruby's name.


Regards


Dave