[LRUG] IronRuby - beware

[Chris O'Sullivan]

In my horrendously naive opinion, I think Microsoft aren't doing this to try
and convert the Ruby community over to MS.

I think they're just trying to give current .Net developers the ways & means
to develop using dynamic languages (Python, Javascript and a dynamic VB are
also in the midst).

For Rubyists this will be surely be a good thing - a whole bunch more
developers are going to take a real interest in Ruby who might not have
otherwise.


On 26/07/07, John Scholes <j3s1c4 at googlemail.com> wrote:
>
> Is it really sensible to tangle with this? The objective is it tie you
> in to MS and, more immediately, to get free comment etc. We have seen
> this umpteen times before with MS. Stay away!
>
> See eg
>
> http://www.computerwire.com/services/service/publication/article/?pid=CWCG005742&aid=A5A30EEE-44EC-4E6D-9547-FFE3EE5D5078
>
>
> which unfortunately needs registration. But here is the first part to
> give the flavour:
>
> > Often lumped together with other web dynamic scripting languages like
> > PHP, Perl, and Python, Ruby has drawn significant buzz thanks to the
> > rails framework that made it even easier to develop web apps. And now
> > Microsoft has released a community preview of its own dialect,
> > IronRuby, which it claims fixes some of Ruby's shortcomings.
> >
> > According to John Lam, program manager for dynamic language run times
> > at Microsoft, the benefit will be much faster performance for web apps
> > that use the Microsoft stack. That means that Ruby gets access to
> > native debuggers, code profiling tools, a C# compiler, and other
> > goodies courtesy of the .NET Framework.
> >
> > But it also means that, unless you refrain from using .NET libraries,
> > IronRuby will only run in Microsoft environments, with one exception.
> > Using Silverlight, Microsoft's multi-browser run time, you could also
> > develop IronRuby-based web apps to reside and run inside the browser
> > client as well.
> >
> > The key to IronRuby is that it is designed to run on Microsoft's
> > Dynamic Language Runtime (DLR), which as the name implies is the
> > add-on designed for web dynamic scripting languages. Like IronRuby,
> > DLR is only in community preview. And, while it would be logical that
> > both technologies would get commercially released at the same time, at
> > this point Microsoft is only saying that it expects DLR to enter
> > general release in about a year, but is not making any
> > prognostications for IronRuby itself.
> >
> > IronRuby was first announced at Microsoft's second Mix conference for
> > web developers, held this last April. This week's announcement is that
> > the language is being released as a community preview under
> > Microsoft's "Permissive License." In effect, it's Microsoft's closest
> > equivalent to the BSD open source license, that allows developers to
> > play around with source code. Within six hours after the preview code
> > was released, the Mono Project (implementing .NET server and client on
> > other platforms) incorporated it within six hours.
> >
> > In this case, Microsoft is asking the community to develop libraries,
> > but for now, is asking for hands-off on the IronRuby compiler, because
> > it depends on another development release technology, the Dynamic
> > Language Runtime (DLR). As an extension to .NET's Common Language
> > Runtime (CLR), Microsoft's DLR is designed to run web dynamic
> > scripting languages. At this point, it too is in community technology
> > preview, but not under any kind of shared or permissive source license.
> >
> > Lam said that the dependency on DLR, which itself is still a work in
> > progress. "Because Microsoft has not finalized the public interfaces
> > of the DLR, we didn't want to end up with external IP mixed into it,
> > as it is part of the CLR."
>
>
> John Scholes
> http://doyoulovems.com/
>
>
>
>
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>
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