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Interview With the Creator of Ruby

Posted by Unknown on from the and-you-thought-java-was-slow dept.

snydeq writes "Ruby creator Yukihiro Matsumoto discusses the past, present, and future of the popular programming language, calling mobile the next target for Ruby: 'I'm currently working on an alternative subset or dialect of Ruby for the small devices. I'm going to make it public early next year. Of course, mobile computing is the way to go, so that's one of the reasons I focus on the Ruby dialect working on the smaller devices.'"

13 of 89 comments (clear)

  1. You know, smaller devices.. by toxonix · · Score: 2

    Most of those smaller devices don't require subsets of functionality or features. Any general purpose language that doesn't require a super heavy runtime environment or a bazillion linked libraries should get along fine with an API to interact with events generated by the device. See Android, etc.

    1. Re:You know, smaller devices.. by gl4ss · · Score: 2

      androids version of _java_ is quite complete.
      it's certainly not midp 1.0 type of subset on the vm side. you know, because you're not lacking things like floats.
      api's are another matter of course. but what would you do with a mouth class if you had no face to scream from.

      if he's talking things like hw abstraction api's, then that's another matter. and highly platform specific. ui classes are also another matter.

      otherwise there's no difference between mobile and non mobile, unless ruby needs some stupid busyloops running and burning electricity? and fyi for some "mobile" platforms you can have ruby already - you can have everything you could have on arm desktop machine, naturally. if they're practical to use from api binding, dependencies etc perspective now that's entirely different matter again.

      but just purely on language level, "mobile optimizations" would translate to optimizing for running on arm and using less power.

      --
      world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
  2. TFA is nothing but fluff by AdmiralXyz · · Score: 4, Insightful

    There's nothing really wrong with TFA, but there's nothing there either. It's so bland. The questions are just "Why did you create Ruby? What's next for Ruby?" I mean, seriously? If you were interviewing someone for a high school newspaper that might be OK, but they really can't do anything better? There's nothing more interesting you could ask Matz?

    --
    Dislike the Electoral College? Lobby your state to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact.
    1. Re:TFA is nothing but fluff by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Oh let's see...

      1. What are prospects of incorporating true, concurrent multithreads?

      2. JIT - why or why not? and when?

      3. Is performance closer to Java realistic for Ruby? What are the obstacles?

      This is just the most pressing stuff and I don't even use Ruby much anymore.

  3. I am not sure why... by Windwraith · · Score: 3, Interesting

    ...but this statement:

    > Of course, mobile computing is the way to go

    It kind of depresses me for some reason. I am not being ironic, I am serious. I don't know why that makes me feel down.

    I feel like all the training I did to be able to code games** in a PC is going to be obsolete before I know it.

    **or any other desktop coding

    1. Re:I am not sure why... by lynnae · · Score: 4, Informative

      I feel like all the training I did to be able to code games** in a PC is going to be obsolete before I know it.

      **or any other desktop coding

      welcome to the world of developing.

      This is how it's been, and how it will continue to be. Keep growing your skill set and you'll be fine (and a better programmer for it).

    2. Re:I am not sure why... by vlm · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I feel like all the training I did to be able to code games** in a PC is going to be obsolete before I know it.

      Training rapidly becomes useless. Education never becomes useless.

      Memorize how to use a linked list library in Pascal = rapidly useless

      Learn what a linked list is, why and when you'd use it = useful forever

      Also much like human languages (supposedly) the first three languages are pretty tough, but once you learn a bit of ten or so, its pretty simple since all the concepts are the same. The hard part is knowing how to index thru an array without a picket fence mistake and figuring out how to troubleshoot it. The easy part is remembering or googling the syntax.

      --
      "Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
    3. Re:I am not sure why... by Windwraith · · Score: 2

      I am not really a professional coder. I don't even work in computer-science related jobs. I just spent my limited brain power into somewhat successfully learning a portable language like C with GL and such.
      Because of that, I am not as passionate about coding as many users in Slashdot. For me it's a means to an end (game dev), and a pretty painful one at that.

      Without time and resources ($$$) to buy books it was a pretty slow and painful experience (specially because asking for coding stuff usually has 2/3 persons telling you to buy a book), having to learn from short (and at times misleading!) snippets on the internet or theoretical papers that at times barely relate to what you want to actually do.

      I only managed to finally master C like one or two years ago.

      Thus, I honestly don't know if I am capable of moving over at this point.
      Maybe if I knew any other programmer in the flesh I'd be able to relit my fire, but I am the only code literate person that I know of.

      (Besides, developing for those devices requires buying one of said device, and in one case I know of, the SDK isn't free. I can't stress the lack of $$ for this enough. I also happened to promise all my games would cost as much as it took to develop them, which is $0.0 until I am either dead or starving to death)

  4. Re:What, what. by EraserMouseMan · · Score: 2

    Does anybody use Ruby (or Ruby on Rails) as the primary language for big-time software projects? Can we name a few that everybody should recognize?

  5. What I want to know... by smooth+wombat · · Score: 2

    how hard was it to find shoes in the correct color then add all those sequins? I mean, I've seen the pair at the Smithsonian but it's my understanding there were others made as well.

    Also, did Dorothy get to keep a pair?

    --
    We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
  6. Re:What, what. by zill · · Score: 2

    Erlang on the backend and RoR on the frontend, actually.

  7. picket fence mistake? by opencity · · Score: 2

    I'm a kludgy self taught coder and I just googled for a moment to no avail ... can you help this perma-newb out:
    What is a "picket fence mistake"?

    --
    Physics is like sex: sure, it may give some practical results, but that's not why we do it.
    1. Re:picket fence mistake? by byner · · Score: 2

      When building a fence, if you put a post say every meter, how many posts do you need for a 10m section of fence?

      It's an example illustrating an one-off error. It's pretty common to get this or similar problems wrong and catch yourself later.