From C to Java to Ruby

I was having this casual conversation with a colleague about Ruby who isn’t using Ruby and I was selling him the elegance of Ruby and all that.
I said – “Remember the feeling when you moved from C development to Java? It felt like you have shed several pounds of weight attached to your shoes and you can now walk light. It is the same Deja Vu when you start to use Ruby coming from Java world.”

Then later when I was at my desk I thought of a better analogy.

• Working with C was like using an Axe, cutting away at a tree trunk. Powerful but tiring and you run the risk of missing the tree and getting your toe.

• Working with Java was like throwing away the Axe but getting a nice hack saw. It was controlled and safe. A little slow but easy to work with.

• But working with saw can be boring monotonous repetitive work. So come in Ruby. Ruby is like a Swiss army knife. Elegant, beautiful, small, doesn’t require you to wrestle with it, can be different things at different times but as the runtimes of today, much slower than Java. You may not be able to cut a tree but can carve beautiful motifs out of it.