From: daz <dooby@...10.karoo.co.uk>
Date: 2003-06-02T13:42:56+09:00
Subject: Re: Interactive programming


"Jason Watkins" <jason_watkins@pobox.com> wrote:
> Just out of curiousity, how often do you find yourself:
>
> 1.) Write ruby in the interactive interpreter
> 2.) Write ruby in files, occasionally calling the interpreter from a shell
>     to test your code


Important:
If you never run Ruby under Windows, skip this post!



DOS shell is rubbish, I use it as a last resort and fear the
sight of a DOS box when it flashes up because it's going
to close before I get to reading what was in it.

I use Ruby Development Environment
http://raa.ruby-lang.org/list.rhtml?name=rde

+ EnglishA.xml language file (while you're there)

It's easy to run irb from within it ...
http://www.rubygarden.org/ruby?RubyDevelopmentEnvironmentExtensions

.... but it's hardly necessary because I keep a tabbed page open
(usually called Blank{n} - no need to think of a name or where
to save it), type (e.g.)

  p 6 + 4

hit F5, and the result is displayed in the output window.

If I'm running a script that produces an output file, that file
can be open in another page and if it has changed since the last
time, RDE asks if I want to reload it.  Click YES and there's the
updated output from the script I just ran.
I can have several scripts "in progress", cut and paste chunks
from one to another etc. and test bits before "committing".

If someone posts an irb script, I can copy it into an edit page
and use the RDE RunBy facility to convert it with this Ruby snippet:

ARGF.each{|lin|
  if lin =~ /\s*irb\(\w+\):\d{3}:\S+\s/
    print $'
  else
    print '#.->', lin
  end
}


I don't really need it to be any easier than that.


No doubt there are some slick Vi(m) / Emacs setups out there
and I like the FreeRIDE project's aims and values:
http://www.rubyide.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl


Irb is brilliant, and I don't think I would have
stayed with Ruby had it not been available at the start
but IMHO, it's not for coding with.


daz