Jeremy McAnally wrote:
> On 1/6/07, James Britt <james.britt / gmail.com> wrote:

>>
>> But in such a case you probably *shouldn't* using Ruby for production
>> development.
>>
>>
> 
> Then how do we get better?  How do we gain applicable, real-world
> programming skills if we never step out and say, "I'm going to use
> this for something meaningful"?

See rubyforge.org

When I started with Ruby in 2001 or so, I was coding Java, and some 
Perl.  There's no way I would have tried to get Ruby into a prime-time 
slot without more experience.  I was working at a company were tech 
leads were paid lip service, and J2EE rules the day (partly due, I 
think, to superficial "success stories" claiming vast gains).

So I started using Ruby for whatever I could think of that would be fun 
and interesting, on my own time.

I left that job by the end of the year.  I realize not everyone has that 
option, but I knew that the company was not one of the things I had the 
power to change, and life's too short to sit a cube and be bored.


> 
>> [snipped a lot of good stuff]
>>
>> Why be concerned over Ruby's popularity?  Or, at least, why be concerned
>> with making Ruby popular among people who don't have the wherewithal or
>> motivation to properly assess it?  Will it cultivate a strong, lasting
>> Ruby community?
>>
> 
> Mostly because people interested in the craft need to pay bills.  I'm
> interested in the craft of software development, but I'm also
> interested in being able to eat.  I would rather spend my time
> learning a langauge that is possibly useful to me in a work
> environment AND enriching...they are not mututally exclusive concepts.
> 

Of course; I'm in the same boat  But I'm skeptical that it is the role 
of ruby-lang.org to help people get work.

A year or two ago, Curt Hibbs started a "Why Ruby?" project on 
rubyforge.org.  It was largely a collection of presentations meant to 
explain essential features of Ruby to developers and/or managers.

That collection was eventually moved over to ruby-doc.org.  It's pretty 
much remained unchanged since then.  If Ruby advocacy is a useful 
pursuit, it may be better served by its own site run by people with the 
time and motivation to look after it.


-- 

James Britt

"Take eloquence and wring its neck."
  - Paul Verlaine