Here is a diagram with a "family tree" showing the history of programming languages. Ruby is in there. http://www.levenez.com/lang/ It shows Ruby cross-polinating from Perl, Eiffel, Smalltalk, and Python. The author also has diagrams for the history of Unix and Windows. The Unix one is very impressive. Unix is truly a diverse family. Cheers, -- Daniel Carrera | "Software is like sex. It's better when it's free". PhD student. | Math Dept. UMD | -- Linus Torvalds