Ruby On Rails an outright PHP Killer???

A website that I visit pretty regularly, Sitepoint.com, today published an excellent introduction for Ruby On Rails (ROR). I, like many of the webdevelopers, have been terribly curious about this almost "magical, no fuss" web development language, hence the time was perfect for Sitepoint to come out with the article.Danny's article on Sitepoint gave a brief introduction, but moreso stressed and emphasized on the "ease of development" that ROR brings along.We've witnessed years of almost three decades of "hero worshipping" OOP techniques in software programming, and for a brief period with the onset of PHP5, we've witnessed the same in the web programming sector. Now with the introduction of ROR, this can only increase .. increase exponentially. =)And it is a good thing, this OOP, it is good!Now as my interest in ROR has surely surfaced, I visit Wikipedia to see what they have to say about this new magical utopian web programming langauge. And I must say the blokes at Wikipedia have done an excellent job maintaining the entry for ROR. It is definitely a must read for anybody even remotely interested.But what really caught my eye was the Philosophy Of Ruby On Rails. It adhere's to the DRY principly, Dry - Don't Repeat Yourself. Something I yearned for in PHP/Perl/ASP/Coldfusion, but like nirvana never could find it. If ROR can ever so remotely make DRY a practical principle, I will be the first to leave all and start 'practicing the ROR religion'.Another defining principle of ROR is - Convention Over Configuration. Which Wikipedia graciously explains as, and I quote:> > "Convention Over Configuration" means that the programmer> only needs to define configuration which is unconventional.> > For example, if there is a Post class in model, the corresponding> table in the database is posts, but if the table is unconventional> (e.g. blogposts), it must be specified manually (set_table_name> "blogposts").>Eh, sounds not too bad for a lazy inefficient web developer like myself, does it .. ;-)As I get all excited about ROR, I've finally decided to try it out on my little localhost tonight. Taking the plunge, metaphorically. I do hope ROR does live up to all this hype that its surrounded by and I've indulged in.

RoR has really captured a great internet presence lately. Even though it might not be that wide-spread yet (especially with hosting solutions), it really seems promising. While trying to build a website for my band, I tried lots of PHP frameworks, eventually settling on greatly modifying/expanding phpBB, which worked, but wasn't that good. Even with the phpBB-based site faltering around (on my localhost), I was really starting to think about betraying PHP and trying out RoR...Then yesterday, all of a sudden, I discovered the gem that is Drupal. It is just great! I think it measures up to (what I've read about) RoR. It's design and is simply amazing! It might be more specific than RoR, but it is exactly what I need.Besides, I didn't really want to start messing around with learning Ruby, and then with installing mod_ruby (or using CGI, whatever) on my webserver. I like PHP.Directed at anyone with experience in using RoR:What advantages has RoR got in respect to Drupal (and I'm talking about the purpose of building a website)?

Drupal is a CMS and Rails is a framework. Rails is a very good framework for ruby. At first you might not like it, but when you get used to it, you'll never want to program in php again if you have that choice. You don't need to spend time writing SQL queries, SQL connection, Template Engine, etc. All you just need to do is to write a short code and the template. It got built-in prototype, scriptaculous. But the fact that most hosting don't support rubyonrails stop it from being widespread. Try Cakephp, a rails inspired framework for php. It isn't as good as rails, but it can help me code alot faster.

Ruby never achieved the hyped that it deserved and along came this framework Rails, which set Ruby in stone.I always believed Ruby would succeed it just needed to get an edge over a long existing and powerful language like PERL. Now don't get me wrong, PERL can still use this framework, and is still a leader in it's own way, driven by huge mobs of programmers all around the world and there will continue to be flamed wars in which I can only see PERL actually standing it's ground due to it's long existence and major improvements, of course if it ever retired, then no doubt the other languages would be able to take that main spotlight. PERL is not in the dark, it's just slowly being tackled by simplifying it's complexities.PERL could have been made easier to use and some developers have done just that, but it would have broken what already existed, so it was not a feasible thing to do a complete language rewrite, these other languages could be seen as PERL's offspring, and that the attention they are seeking is really just to be known.RoR was something I looked at when the hype of Ruby started reaching people. I investigated into it and looked at whether now was the time to change, or whether I should continue with what I know and then later dive into it. I actually stuck with what I know now and will dive l ater in when I see reason to, it was quite similar to the transition I took with C to C++, I never changed overnight, it was slowing dawning on me that C wasn't efficiently doing what I needed which ultimately made me change. Other languages came about but to me C++ still proved to be efficient enough for my doings and unless there is a must to change, I will start going down different alleys until I come across the language that does what I need.My change from PERL to PHP was not due to efficiency, but because PHP reflected a likeness to C++ that this familiar ground I was so use to was a must, so that I could maintain the same awareness when developing in C++ or in PHP. I still believe PERL to be a far more superior language and would not ever consider trying to outperform PERL with PHP, as I can say it's just not going to happen as easy as it sounds.Ruby does deserve some lime light, but it's claims to be better than PERL can only be resolved in an ultimate test for supremacy. Rather than it's newer it's got to be better. If there's any PERL to Ruby changers, I would definitely like to hear how they feel this language is or any PHP to Ruby changers, as it's always good to understand views from a programming aspect. Some people including myself find lazy programming inappropriate at times, but it probably leaves more hair on your head than some situations I've been in.Cheers,MC

Thankx for the information friends.

I got some info too, which i got from "cnet news"

 

Can one man and a mantra of "radical simplicity" change the world of Web development?

David Heinemeier Hansson, a 26-year-old Copenhagen native, has built a "framework" to help Web developers be more productive and has released the package of tools through an open-source project.

 

His software, Ruby on Rails, only out for a little more than a year, has started a buzz among the legions of developers and high-level executives that track the trend-driven world of software development.

News.context

What's new:

Ruby on Rails, a relatively new Web development framework, has become popular among programmers for its simplicity and productivity.

 

Bottom line:

Although created by just one person, the software is having an impact and getting noticed by pioneering programmers eager to spot hot, new trends. Some analysts are recommending it for new Web applications.

Hansson's quest to build a practical and productive Web development framework demonstrates how a single person can shake up the status quo, even in a development world where a few companies dominate.

 

The trick, said Hansson, is to "slaughter the holy cows," the well-understood ideas of computer science that dictate how programmers work. In many cases, software vendors design products for difficult problems, an approach that leads to excess complexity, he said.

 

His goal with Ruby on Rails is not to create a sophisticated development framework that the engineers at Google or Amazon.com will flock to. Instead, he has focused on creating templates and designs that tackle the unglamorous problems, such as making database modifications, that the great majority of Web developers face every day.

 

"The major delusion I want to shatter is that you can successfully use the same types and tools for solving the biggest problems in the world and have a pleasant time applying that to solving the normal problems of the world," Hansson said.

 

Ruby on Rails is not used nearly as much as other Web tools such as PHP, Java or Microsoft tools. But it has caught the attention of some of the influential programmers who help popularize new products.

 

David Geary, who has authored books on Java and sits on the technical committee for the latest Java Web programming model, has found that Ruby on Rails is five to 10 times faster than comparable Java frameworks. Like Java did a decade ago, Ruby on Rails is getting developers excited by making them more productive, he said.

Edited July 2, 2007 by vidit (see edit history)

I have heard of Ruby on Rails before on things like HotScripts and occasional email newsletters about web development, but I have never actually investigated it before. In fact, I have never even googled it or looked at anything like it before.Is it really better than PHP? Is it popular in the sense that big well-known sites use it? Is it compatible with Xisto?It sounds neutral in my knowledge right now, but my opinion may change after actually reading it on Wikipeida or somewhere.

it depends if it's better than PHP, for example you could try Zend Framework with PHP and you won't need to do a lot of things too, Ruby on Rails is also a framework for Ruby, but because Ruby is a better language than PHP it's framework is better, but ZF (Zend Framework) really is a great peace of software and it's free, if you move from simple PHP programming to ZF, it might be hard, but with time you learn it it really gets easy to create applications for Web, you just need to get used to it and you'll never want to do programming with PHP without any framework...

I took a look at Ruby on Rails applications in the Xisto cPanel and it looked a bit confusing. You have to create applications (like other scripting languages) but I don't know how. So I guess I'll stick with PHP for now.If someone can successfully explain to me why Ruby is better than PHP (powerful, features, etc), then I might switch. But PHP is very widely used, and I think I'll stick with that for now since I know it

Quite a coincidence, I've just re-started writing some sort of personal webpage wich I'll be hosting here at Xisto. Always looking for something new I'll now probably take a look at this ruby thing and maybe use it instead of php (even tough my personal page isn't going to use a lot of scripting except for some ajax to make it look a bit more appealing ).