Hi,

I found this article today :)

E. Saynatkari wrote:
> Well, Ruby is strictly interpreted using the parse tree instead
> of VM opcodes which may or may not (depending on who you ask)
> make a difference. Ruby is pretty slow but usually Fast Enough(tm).
> 
> You could try to run your script on YARV[1] to see if it helps.

On my Linux (on VMware) machine:

  Ruby: time elapsed: 27.811268 sec.
  YARV: time elapsed: 2.892428 sec.

(YARV with some special optimization option)

Regards,
-- 
// SASADA Koichi at atdot dot net