Why we chose ruby

26 Feb 2012

I’ve been using PHP all along at Yahoo!, Zynga and Interviewstreet. While building hacks and pet projects, it was always python. Django for full sites and web.py for apis.

When we started, language choice was a hard decision. Only one of us knew ruby, PHP was never in the list of choices and python was an option.

We went ahead with Ruby. We built close to 5 prototypes with it. It was hard for the first one. Plenty of googling for every language keyword.

It really did help us when we had to iterate fast.

The expressiveness of the language is as good as Python and Javascript put together. After few weeks it is easier to think in ruby inside your head.

community support – almost everything you need is already written. You just have to put the blocks together.

Plugins (gems), Packaging (bundler), Version Management(rvm) and environment management are huge plus.

With that said, here are some places for you to get started on ruby.

Glimpse through Ryan Bates’ Getting started with Rails
You don’t have to read through a Ruby book to start. Just start with Rails directly. Ways to start:
- Do Rails for zombies.
- See Ryan Bates’ source for rails casts. Start with routes.rb, then controller. Rails guide will help you if you are lost with jargons.
- Have the cross-language reference cheat sheet, it helps.
Before you build anything have a look at Ruby Toolbox if someone has already built it. Reuse.
Prefer MongoDB and Mongoid over MySQL and any other NoSQL systems. It helps you to change the schema without any second thought.

It will take few days to be on speed, but worth the effort. If you are using PHP at your work, I’d recommend choosing Ruby for your pet projects. The biggest advantage that a language/framework can give you is ability to finish your project in a weekend from nothing. You can easily focus on your idea with available rubygems.

If you are sure that your project needs to operate on high-scale from day one, then probably rails is not a right choice.