After my first day back at my University, I was quickly reminded that
not everyone in the world embraces the "You'll shoot your eye out"
nature of Ruby as much as we all do.  I just started a course on
object oriented design in C++ and naturally the issues of security
came up as soon as the fact that I had been working in Ruby had been
mentioned.

Rather than spending an hour arguing for why Ruby's openness makes
*my* life easier, I decided that i'd do a little research and digging
around and then form an O'Reilly blog article on the topic.  As part
of that research, I'm asking the RubyTalk community for some well
founded opinions that make the case for dynamicity and openness,
particularly the meta-programming tricks many of us have become
acquainted with.

I'd also like to hear places that people would NOT use ruby due to
it's open nature, and the reasons for that.  I'd like this article to
be more a technical piece on why a little bit of life on the wild side
can be a wise decision, and also why it can be less of a dangerous
endeavor than some might believe when done correctly.  I'd like to
avoid zealotry and flamage and my meta-programming-fu can kick your
static ass type things, and instead focus on the nuts and bolts of the
issue.

Anything you can offer up would be much appreciated, your experiences
on various projects, resources you've found that address this topic,
experiences with 'secure' languages who's benefits did not outweigh
the costs, insight on the benefits on an open design baked into a
language, functionality that would be difficult or impossible to
replicate in a more rigid setting, etc.

My goal is to produce a well formed article that will show the
cautious incomer to Ruby that  we're not simply running with scissors
over here :)

I do have a few of my own ideas on the topic, and I will contribute
them for your review and suggestions if they are not brought up by
others.  I'd like to base this article heavily on the experiences of
those active in the community, so please do share!

Thanks

-Greg