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Zed Shaw, creator of the popular Mongrel HTTP daemon / library, has decided it was high time to tear into the Ruby/Rails community for many different complaints that he has been collecting over the last few years. "Rails is a Ghetto" is Shaw's self-proclaimed exit strategy from the Rails community. "This is that rant. It is part of my grand exit strategy from the Ruby and Rails community. I don't want to be a 'Ruby guy' anymore, and will probably start getting into more Python, Factor, and Lua in the coming months. I've got about three or four more projects in the works that will use all of those and not much Ruby planned. This rant is full of stories about companies and people who've either pissed in my cheerios somehow or screwed over friends. I can back all of them up from emails, IRC chat logs, or with witnesses. Nothing in here is a lie unless it's really obviously a lie through exaggeration, and there's a lot of my opinion as well."

7 of 616 comments (clear)

  1. Team Dynamics Lead to Tantrums by eldavojohn · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Before you spend the time reading this, let me point out that this isn't really technically oriented. I was hoping for some massive teardown of Ruby/Rails performance or load handling capabilities but ... yeah, didn't take away much from this other than this 'Zed' character can be quite abrasive.

    Only a fucking tool bag piece of shit would:

    * spend 10-20 minutes calling me names over IRC,
    * not have the balls to say any of that to my face,
    * say I'm a dick for wanting to use a different (established) publish/review model,
    * and then demolish such an important file for a project,
    * keeping everyone stumped and pissed for an hour,
    * therefore proving me right.

    This is exactly what makes Rails a ghetto. A bunch of half-trained former PHP morons who never bother to sit down and really learn the computer science they were too good to study in college. BTW, this is true about Kevin as he's an English major or something stupid (and it shows).

    Hats off to you Kevin, you fucking prick. I'm enjoying my vacation too. Ok, this is the summation of his first point. He got into a verbal argument with someone on his team about how patches should be handled. Kevin thought people should be able to submit patches to his workspace while Zed vehemently did not.

    People commonly have disagreements, work them out.

    The fact that this (largely nontechnical) issue is his first point disheartens me and makes me wary of ever working with Zed no matter how brilliant he is. Perhaps this is another example of how non-personal communication (forums/IRC/IMs/e-mail) leads to heated debates over absolutely nothing. I would start to point out that Zed did call Kevin a 'mofo' first before Kevin called him a 'dick' but I would hesitate as name calling and the like is for children.

    It's a wonder Zed gets anything done other than by himself to me.

    As for his complaints about companies, I have to warn him that bad companies are everywhere ... just like bad people. What does any of this have to do with Ruby or Rails? Why are you so certain this is going to die? Because there are some idiots here and there trying to use it?

    I hate to say this but after reading this first part of the rant, I think Zed is just as big (if not half) of the problem of the community being in shambles as any of his targets are.
    --
    My work here is dung.
    1. Re:Team Dynamics Lead to Tantrums by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      There were some nuggets of information hidden amongst the general whining though.

      Things like having complained to the rails team about its thread safety and having the rails team stubbornly insist that it wasn't possible to make it thread-safe up until the point where someone went off and wrote a better version that was thread-safe. Things like that, if it's true, don't inspire a whole lot of confidence in RoR, regardless of how tactless the critique is.

      Yes, he's got the kind of personality flaws that are, unfortunately, all too common in the tech industry. But I don't think that alone means we should automatically dismiss everything he says.

  2. Re:Still no job? by AuMatar · · Score: 5, Insightful

    What, you don't like profanity laced rants aimed at you and your employees, from someone who obviously believes his and only his opinion matters?

    Based on the writing on his site, I wouldn't hire him for anything. Even if he's a god among programmers, I can hire someone who's 80% as good and causes fewer problems in the workplace, and likely come out ahead due to that.

    --
    I still have more fans than freaks. WTF is wrong with you people?
  3. Zed Shaw: A master at self parody by greg_barton · · Score: 5, Insightful
    I'd never heard of Zed Shaw before this story, but he will now be who I think of when the words "self" and "parody" are juxtaposed in my mind. To wit:

    This means that thanks to Larry Flynt I can stab them in the ear verbally, insult them, question their sexual orientation, and say anything that's true and they just have to take it. Their only recourse is to write their pathetic little rebuttals in their stupid little blogs.

    Obligatory pot/kettle/black reference.

    I'll add one more thing to the people reading this: I mean business when I say I'll take anyone on who wants to fight me. You think you can take me, I'll pay to rent a boxing ring and beat your fucking ass legally.

    O....K.... I think that stands by itself.

    But wait! There's more...

    I've been thinking this over ever since I realized that Mongrel and Rails more or less killed my career.

    No, I believe you're doing that...right now...

    Before Mongrel I was building kick ass software for the NYC Dept. of Correction with a tiny team.

    And, based on the "beat your fucking ass" statements above, he'll be utilizing that software as a client at some point.

    After Mongrel I couldn't get a gang of monkeys to rape me, so forget any jobs.

    Seriously, based on reading only a portion of his post, I wouldn't hire this man even if he was a coding god. I don't think his woes are due to his previous co-workers. Textbook example of a serious attitude problem.
  4. Wow by andawyr · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That is truly one bitter individual.

    I mean, there's such a thing as burning bridges, but he's taken it to the next level. I know for a fact that if I ever received a resume from such an individual, it would go straight into the trash.

    As far as I'm concerned, interpersonal skills count for a lot - even if your a genius, in a real environment you'll have to function as part of a team. This guy, well, it seems that he has real difficulties in a team environment. Sure, he may have worked with some individuals that were not up to his standards (would anyone be?), but to say what he said...it's too much.

    Good riddance to him.

  5. Re:Make the bad man stop by Henriok · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Maybe I'm confused. I thought the little motto up top said "News for Nerds. Stuff that MATTERS." Who cares about this?

    I care. Not so much in the context of Rails, Ruby or Mongrel, but in the context of being an employee in the IT business. Working in teams, working with excentric individuals, stupid bosses, geniuses, hacks, nice but incompetent, obnoxious but blazingly creative, hard working average joes, brilliant slackers. All this is what we all meet every day. It's great to hear these stories, since we all can relate to them, pehaps come to terms with our own failings and forgive the failings in others.

    I feel for Zed, I really do. It seems to me that he's one guy who've been screwed one too many times, and breaking down is just too common under such circumstances. People skills, yeah. He might not have them, but reading a story like this makes me more proficient in that department. So.. I think it matters. It matters a lot. To me. To us all.

    --

    - Henrik

    - when the Shadows descend -
  6. Re:It's sad that this will reflect on Ruby itself by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I don't think this is about rails hype. This is the case of a prima donna who can't understand that his poisonous attitude is to blame for his unemployment, and not the community that gave him an identity as a useful asshole to have around. Meltdown. Move along, nothing to see here.