These concerns are exactly the ones I was asked at the first two  
companies where I wrote ruby. They are valid concerns and whilst they  
didn't prevent me from using ruby they certainly influenced my career  
sucess.  Managing these forces requires skill at persuasion and  
marketing, a lical track record, and good luck.

Sent from my iPhone

On Dec 30, 2008, at 9:19 PM, Steven D'Aprano <steve / REMOVE-THIS-cybersource.com.au 
 > wrote:

> On Tue, 30 Dec 2008 07:36:03 -0800, Phlip wrote:
>
>>> If you supply services to corporates, what sort of case can you make
>>> for using Ruby rather than Java, which is in use everywhere? (I'm  
>>> not
>>> thinking of Rails here, which is a rather specialized).
>>
>> If "services" is a web api, why should they care what language you  
>> wrote
>> an application in?
>
> Put yourself in the shoes of the company paying for the software.  
> There
> are many reasons why you should care about the language it is  
> written in.
>
> Does the language make it easy or difficult to write correct code? How
> easy is it to maintain later?
>
> If the original developer gets hit by a bus, can you get somebody to
> replace him easily? What if he turns out to be a real prima donna, or
> gets bored halfway through the project and leaves? Is there is a  
> shortage
> of developers in this language? Are you going to be reliant on a  
> single
> lone-cowboy, or even a single company? What is the learning curve to
> train somebody new in the language? Is there a steady stream of new
> developers learning this language so you can maintain it years from  
> now?
>
> If (when) the project goes over-budget and late, can you prove that  
> you
> used industry standard practices? If you use some weird language  
> nobody
> has heard of, and things go bad, will you be blamed for choosing a  
> toy or
> experimental language not up to the job? Can you say, "anyone else  
> would
> have made the same choice"?
>
> In five years time, or ten, will the chosen language still be  
> supported
> and updated? Will there be security patches, or will it be abandoned?
>
>
> Generally, corporations are risk-averse. Their decisions are made  
> more on
> the basis of "What if this goes wrong?" rather than "What's the best  
> that
> can happen?". If you're risk-adverse, you're expecting that the  
> project
> will end up late, over-budget or missing features, and let's face  
> it, IT
> projects are notorious for doing all three. The IT world is full of
> people who will promise you the world, and then fail to deliver.  
> Imagine
> you're not a developer yourself, or your only development experience  
> was
> a bit of VB ten years ago, and maybe a few Excel macros. Why should  
> you
> believe these brash young kids with their Ruby or Haskell or Python?  
> Talk
> is cheap, and it's not their money being spent.
>
>
> That's the *rational* reasons. Of course there are plenty of  
> irrational
> reasons too. But if you can't make the case for Ruby against the  
> rational
> concerns, you certainly won't be able to get past the irrational ones.
>
>
>
> -- 
> Steven
>