[ANN] Why Ruby? -- A Resource for Promoting Ruby

[Curt Hibbs]

I'm pleased to announce the kickoff of RubyForge project called "Why Ruby?"
whose goal is to help spread the use of ruby by providing a central
repository of presentations, papers and advice on promoting Ruby.

Please visit (and contribute to) our site:

http://whyruby.rubyforge.org/

Below I have pasted some of the text from the project's home page.

Curt

===================================

= Why Ruby? =

After all, there's Python and Perl (even Java, C#, and C++), so why Ruby?

The <i>Why Ruby</i> project is here to help you answer that question.
Whether
your audience is corporate management, your team lead, or your fellow
developers, this site can provide you with the material and answers you need
to make a winning presentation.

== Goals ==

The goal of this project is to address the practical aspects of getting
Ruby more widely adopted
in the workplace by being an ongoing resource to those people who want
to promote Ruby.

This site will contain:

* Advice on promoting Ruby
* A repository of contributed presentations and papers that can be reused
(in whole or in part) in your presentation.
* Example presentations for different audiences created specifically for
release on this site.
* Links external resources that may be valuable to the promoter of Ruby.

 

[Jim Menard]

I'm pleased to announce the kickoff of RubyForge project called "Why

Ruby?"
whose goal is to help spread the use of ruby by providing a central
repository of presentations, papers and advice on promoting Ruby.

Please visit (and contribute to) our site:

Are you looking for technical articles (introductions to the language),
or less technical advocacy pieces?

Jim
--
Jim Menard, (e-mail address removed), http://www.io.com/~jimm/
"The theory of computation states that all automatons can be emulated
by a Turing machine. I have a less abstract but more practical motto: If
you can do it on Intel, you can do it damn near anywhere!"
-- Eugene O'Neil

 

[James Britt]

Are you looking for technical articles (introductions to the language),
or less technical advocacy pieces?

Just a reminder: ruby-doc.org [0], the home site for the Ruby
Documentation Project (now in its second smash year!) continues its
long-standing offer to host any and all Ruby documentation, be it
promotional, technical, API, how-to, or whatever.

So, if something may not be a good fit for Why Ruby?, it always has a
home on ruby-doc.org.

And, of course, if you know of any Ruby documentation that is not listed
on ruby-doc, please let me know so we can link to it [1].


James Britt
jbritt AT ruby-doc DOT org

[0] http://www.ruby-doc.org/
[1] http://www.ruby-doc.org/articles/

 

[Joel VanderWerf]

http://whyruby.rubyforge.org/

Some of the markup on that page is being rendered literally. This is
what I see:

<i>If this is your first visit here, please click on Preferences above
to register so that your name can be associated with your changes and
contributions.</i>

It might look better if this wiki was written in Ruby. <a
href="http://www.instiki.org">Instiki</a> is quite good.

 

[Michael Vondung]

It might look better if this wiki was written in Ruby. <a
href="http://www.instiki.org">Instiki</a> is quite good.

That's a really nice find! I had been looking for a slim wiki that works
with Apache and MySQL, since I just need it as a local workspace (todo
lists, notes, articles, text dump, etcetera). Instiki meets all of my
requirements. Thanks for the tip!

M.

 

[Joel VanderWerf]

That's a really nice find! I had been looking for a slim wiki that works
with Apache and MySQL, since I just need it as a local workspace (todo
lists, notes, articles, text dump, etcetera). Instiki meets all of my
requirements. Thanks for the tip!

A minor misunderstanding...

I like insticki, too, but that recommendation was text I was quoting
from the "Why Ruby" page, http://whyruby.rubyforge.org, just to show the
markup problems.

 

[David Garamond]

Are you looking for technical articles (introductions to the
language), or less technical advocacy pieces?

Just a reminder: ruby-doc.org [0], the home site for the Ruby
Documentation Project (now in its second smash year!) continues its
long-standing offer to host any and all Ruby documentation, be it
promotional, technical, API, how-to, or whatever.

So, if something may not be a good fit for Why Ruby?, it always has a
home on ruby-doc.org.

Here's an idea. How about a wiki for Wanted/Requested Libraries?

Most of the time I had to use good ol' Perl instead of Ruby is because
of libraries. CPAN is _so_ complete, while Ruby still trails quite
behind (not just behind Perl, Python too). Several personal examples of
mine:

- a fast/C-based buffer XOR (last time I checked there are several libs
to do bitwise operation but strangely none can XOR two string buffers);

- diff algorithms (there are several in Perl);

- interacting with subversion (there are already several SVN::* Perl
modules showing up in CPAN);


The Requested Libraries wiki could let people tell what modules they
need, and let other people vote too what they would like to see most.
Then yet some other looking for projects will know what is currently on
demand.

 

[Gavin Sinclair]

Here's an idea. How about a wiki for Wanted/Requested Libraries?

It exists, of course. That's the problem with Wikis. Creating a page
like this seems like a great idea, and of course it is in some sense.
But you don't know about it until you ask here. And for every person
who asks, there's 10 who don't.

I can't remember the name of the page, but MissingLibraries might just
get there.

Most of the time I had to use good ol' Perl instead of Ruby is because
of libraries. CPAN is _so_ complete, while Ruby still trails quite
behind (not just behind Perl, Python too). Several personal examples of
mine:

- a fast/C-based buffer XOR (last time I checked there are several libs
to do bitwise operation but strangely none can XOR two string buffers);

- diff algorithms (there are several in Perl);

- interacting with subversion (there are already several SVN::* Perl
modules showing up in CPAN);

None of these sound difficult (given that Perl implementations exist).
If I had a need for something like those, and had the time to do so,
I'd port to Ruby as needed. I don't think the time required would be
all that great, either.

The Requested Libraries wiki could let people tell what modules they
need, and let other people vote too what they would like to see most.
Then yet some other looking for projects will know what is currently on
demand.

There's no evidence that the Ruby economy works in this way. People
scratch itches rather than looking for in-demand projects.

Not that anything you've written is a bad idea... A well-known,
up-to-date list of requested libraries would be a great resource.

Cheers,
Gavin

 

[gabriele renzi]

il Tue, 11 May 2004 06:45:38 +0900, Gavin Sinclair

I can't remember the name of the page, but MissingLibraries might just
get there.
maybe:
http://rubygarden.org/ruby?LibraryModules


Not that anything you've written is a bad idea... A well-known,
up-to-date list of requested libraries would be a great resource.

'well known' sounds hard :/

 

[David Garamond]

Are you looking for technical articles (introductions to the
language), or less technical advocacy pieces?

Just a reminder: ruby-doc.org [0], the home site for the Ruby
Documentation Project (now in its second smash year!) continues its
long-standing offer to host any and all Ruby documentation, be it
promotional, technical, API, how-to, or whatever.

So, if something may not be a good fit for Why Ruby?, it always has a
home on ruby-doc.org.

Here's an idea. How about a wiki for Wanted/Requested Libraries?

Most of the time I had to use good ol' Perl instead of Ruby is because
of libraries. CPAN is _so_ complete, while Ruby still trails quite
behind (not just behind Perl, Python too). Several personal examples of
mine:

- a fast/C-based buffer XOR (last time I checked there are several libs
to do bitwise operation but strangely none can XOR two string buffers);

- diff algorithms (there are several in Perl);

- interacting with subversion (there are already several SVN::* Perl
modules showing up in CPAN);


The Requested Libraries wiki could let people tell what modules they
need, and let other people vote too what they would like to see most.
Then yet some other looking for projects will know what is currently on
demand.

 

[Simon Strandgaard]

Here's an idea. How about a wiki for Wanted/Requested Libraries?

Ok idea.


[In order not to forget this idea I thus post it here]

I have also an idea: Recently I have been thinking of devote one day
in my calender to review 10 ruby-projects.. I don't know which projects
I wish to review (maybe the last 10 of top 20 on rubyforge?)
Then I would have 1 hour to each project, and could write some interesting
stuff about them. How was installation? What is their purpose? Is the
goal of the project fullfilled? How was documentation? How was code?

When done I would post the review-results at ruby-talk?


Too bad I don't have time fore it at the moment.. but I hope.
Suggestions?

 

[gabriele renzi]

il Wed, 12 May 2004 17:21:54 +0900, Simon Strandgaard

I have also an idea: Recently I have been thinking of devote one day
in my calender to review 10 ruby-projects.. I don't know which projects
I wish to review (maybe the last 10 of top 20 on rubyforge?)
Then I would have 1 hour to each project, and could write some interesting
stuff about them. How was installation? What is their purpose? Is the
goal of the project fullfilled? How was documentation? How was code?

When done I would post the review-results at ruby-talk?

it would be nice
But maybe it could be better to put it on the WhyRuby wiki and just
show the link to the page here

Too bad I don't have time fore it at the moment.. but I hope.

doh!

 

[Paul Vudmaska]

--------------010903080505030201090603
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

il Wed, 12 May 2004 17:21:54 +0900, Simon Strandgaard
<[email protected]> ha scritto::




it would be nice
But maybe it could be better to put it on the WhyRuby wiki and just
show the link to the page here





doh!

Would'nt it be neat for that to be built into raa - ability to comment .
1) And how many downloads
2) Comments on installation, docs, purpose fulfillment of purpose
3) Over all rating
3) Success stories
4) Failures

--------------010903080505030201090603--