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how is it flamebait for posting the truth? the average rubyist seems to turn into a rabid blog dog at the mere mention of issues with Ruby. you guys aren't helping by complaining on developer opinion.

Good point.

The article isn't particularly well-written, but does bring up a good point... and flame bait is always fun.

The problem was more related to lack of truth. The article in question was badly written and most of the complaints were "This is not java". If you are going to judge languages on how much "java" they are like then count me out of the programmers club. And for some reason they attacked cartoon figures in a book. I don't like java but in arguing how bad java is I dont go talking about the illustrations in "Learning Java in 39 days: tenth edition".

Oh yeah.. Try attacking java where java developers can hear. Ruby's "rabid blog dog" are no match. Dave Thomes has actually received threatining letters for suggesting Ruby as Java replacement.

First off, the articles, either the one linked or the original one referred to, do not represent "truth" of any kind. They represent opinion, which is fine, but let's call it what it is.

Secondly, the original article's exceptions to Ruby could almost, down the line, apply equally well to Python as to Ruby. They're not specifically Ruby-centric, most of them. It would have been nice if someone who actually has significant experience with dynamic languages would have done some kind of evaluation. But he refers to "Ruby's dynamic typing" as a proffered elegance of the language. God. Come on, man. Dynamic typing ain't exactly new and ain't exactly specific to Ruby. Jesus.

Finally, I'm wary of people who claim that they're "immune to hype". Give me a break. No one's *immune* to hype. Hype drives the industry, promotes the rapid dissemination of new technologies, builds legitimate excitement and gets people polarized in a very positive way, by forcing them to defend existing technology choices or adopt new ones. Yes, hype does have negative qualities, too. But so what if Rubyists are over-enthusiastic about Ruby? A lot of profitable discussion has been generated as a result. Anyway, in five years it'll be something else. Yay. Welcome to the development world.

Yeah, Huw is overreacting. The ruby community's response to the original article "What's Wrong With Ruby" was fairly respectable. Most people passionately disagreed with the article, and were civil about voicing disagreements. A few rubyists went to far and said stupid things (the pink shirt comment & all), but thats not a big deal. No one got too nasty and its just healthy dialogue for a particularly zealous developer community.

Gotta love a bit of flame bate

For every one comment, there's 50 developers who read the article and moved on. I don't think a few feisty quotes is telling of an inferiority complex.