Ruby: It's Like Python but Better

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I downloaded a build of the Ruby programming environment for Windows from http://rubyforge.org/frs/?group_id=167 and got found a primer for the Ruby programming language at http://www.rubycentral.com/book/; the Windows build I found was a little out of date, but the build at http://www.ruby-lang.org/en/ is lacking many of the utilities that are bundled with the version I found first.

Anyway, I'm only on Chapter 2 right now, so I might write a brief review of Ruby when I've finished reading the primer and have fiddled around with it a little more.

The reason why I say it's like Python but better is that Ruby is object oriented from the beginning; OOP wasn't an afterthought. The languages do bear some similarites, though.

I like to think of it as Perl with better OO syntax. Matz was influenced heavily by Perl in the design. Look at how regular expressions are done. Python's regular expression stuff is not a lot different from just using PCRE or something in C (ie. it sucks).

I have been using Ruby lightly for about 5 or 6 years now. It's a pretty nice language but its Achilles heal is the performance. It is one of the worst performing scripting languages I use. They keep saying there will be a faster VM but they have been saying that for 5 years or more. Other than that it's very good.

I wish the VM's for languages like Perl, Python, and Ruby were smaller because most of them are simply too big to be embedded and I end up having to use Lua which is a decent but much less functional language.