Because Difficult Things *Must* Be Better

chromatic on 2007-12-17T22:08:59

Ruby's on a good part of its development. See, we're at the point where you don't need to write your own CGI, XML, or database library to use it. But there's plenty of libraries that are at the 0.6 point that need somebody to push them to 1.0.

— Ken Wronkiewicz, 9 reasons why you should build a website in Ruby, even if you don't use Rails

As far as breathless fan pieces go, this isn't too bad, though I have trouble reading reason #9 as anything more than "If you want to do anything slightly less than ubiquitous, you have a terrific opportunity to start or join a tangential project to get your job done."

I'm not sure the lack of the CPAN is really an advantage.

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It's a somewhat valid point..

Alias on 2007-12-17T23:31:09

While it's wrong about the language, it's probably a valid point purely in terms of the community.

People like communities where they are able to find a positive position relatively to their peers.

There's been an argument for a while that the CPAN community can be a tough one because all the more approachable problems have already been solved.

Re:It's a somewhat valid point..

phaylon on 2007-12-18T00:03:33

I personally do find it "tough," in some sense of the word. Although I'm not sure that is just a bad thing.

For example, the roughness usually takes place at a rather high niveau, I very seldomly feel personally attacked, and if I do, it mostly turned out as a misunderstanding since we were both non-native speakers trying to communicate in english. And I have the impression that those discussions and arguments are good to keep the quality high.

Better saying something twice than missing the possibility that someone could learn something (either the speaker or the one spoken to... err, you know what I mean)

Re:It's a somewhat valid point..

chromatic on 2007-12-18T00:30:25

People who like to or want to join communities like communities where they can find a positive relation. I'm not sure that someone who wants to write a website in Ruby to see what it's like necessarily wants to make a contribution to a community in order to finish the website.

Re:It's a somewhat valid point..

Alias on 2007-12-18T04:31:37

Of course.

There's a big difference between people that want to be part of a community and people that just want to get the job done.

Re:It's a somewhat valid point..

stu42j on 2007-12-18T17:09:26

Surely you are not suggesting that CPAN only has room for one solution/problem. ;-)

There is still the opportunity to re-solve those problems better, faster, etc. Email:: and ::Tiny come to mind.

Re:It's a somewhat valid point..

Aristotle on 2007-12-19T10:30:26

All the more approachable problems have already been solved.

I’ll yet upload my very own template engine to CPAN…

DIfficult things can sometimes be better

Dominus on 2007-12-18T14:34:24

I'm not sure what this guy's point is, but I sometimes make a similar argument: The drawback of a do-it-yourself situation is that you have to do it yourself. But the advantage is that you get to do it yourself.

If you like to have things your own way, you might like to get involved in a community where they're still figuring out whose way they're going to have.

Why not use the right tool?

brian_d_foy on 2007-12-18T16:32:07

Curiously, none of the reasons he listed in the nine to use Ruby really spoke to the real reason to use anything: because it's the right tool for the job. I guess embedding C++ in Ruby might indirectly relate to that.

Apart from something specific you have to accomplish, there's no technical reason to use any particular language. Everything else is just humans having baggage. Anyone who recommends a language to you without knowing what you are trying to accomplish is just being a fanboy (or someone trying to get your money).

So, I'll wait for the list that includes as the first reason "Because it solves your problem with minimal effort". Along with that, I'm happy to accept PHP as the right tool in some cases, and certainly willing to use something other than Perl.