Ruby Musings (IMHO):

None of the following should be taken as a criticism of Ruby or any of
the persons involved in its development and/or support. Ruby, and its
people, are great!

Reference Documentation: There is a need for complete reference
documentation that is available at the time of, and included in, each
major non-development release of Ruby. As wonderful as books like
"Programming Ruby" and "Ruby in a Nutshell" are, they are not complete,
timely, up-to-date Ruby references (obviously beyond the author's
control). Also, reference documentation should be available in all
languages recognized to be important to Ruby's continued development,
expansion, and global domination ;-) Alphabetically, English, German,
Japanese, Spanish, etc. (An English speaking/writing perspective). Think
globally, Ruby is no longer only a Japanese treasure (a possible
headache for Matz) the rest of the world has discovered you.

Rudydoc: The truly exciting feature about Java is not (only) the cross
platform capabilities, but the fact that one can keep the documentation
in the code and generate HTML hyperlinked files, of the same, at the
push of a button. Ruby needs this! "RDtool" is a step in the right
direction, but this facility needs to be an integral part of Ruby
(javadoc relies on the java interpreter to perform its function), be
included in the Ruby SDK, and not rely on the installation of other
libraries nor be a user-installed option.

Ruby Core: Keep it core! It appears to be fraying at the edges slightly
(amateur talking here). Lots of requests, from the really necessary to
pet ones, are being suggested. Take a hard look at them, incorporate the
core ones and make extensions or libraries out of the rest. Take the
necessary time; something that sounds core today might not tomorrow or,
when viewed, in the overall picture.

Synonyms: Pick a name and only one name for methods (and everything
else). Add a deprecation feature to Ruby to work towards eliminating
existing synonyms. Working in a real-time shop where multiple parameter
names exist between releases for the same concept (long story why, and
you do not want to know), I cannot emphasize enough the need to have
individual concepts that are identified by one face only.

Miscellaneous: Lots of cool code is passing thru the various Ruby forums
(this one included). Capture it. Categorize it. Wrap it up in neat
packages. Make it available as examples, extensions, or libraries
distributed with Ruby. Some of this is already going on, but some is
getting lost. Do not let these ideas become difficult or impossible to
find, or worse lost.

Just a few musings (ramblings, if you prefer).

PS: Thanks Matz