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 <h1>NetBeans Day Speaker: Charlie Nutter Talks About Ruby, JRuby, and JRuby on Rails</h1>

 <p><br>

 <i>Charles Nutter has been a Java developer since 1996. He

 currently works full-time as a core developer on JRuby at Sun

 Microsystems. He led the open-source LiteStep project in the late 90s

 and started working on Ruby in the fall of 2004. Since then he has been

 a member of the JRuby team, helping to make it a true alternative Ruby

 platform. Charles presented JRuby at RubyConference 2005 and

 co-presented at JavaOne 2006 with Thomas Enebo. Charles blogs on Ruby

 and Java at <a href="http://headius.blogspot.com/">headius.blogspot.com</a>.</i>
 </p>
 <br>

       <h1>Charlie Nutter</h1>

 <br>

 <img src="../../../images_www/javaone/2007/cnutter.jpg" alt="Charlie Nutter" style="width: 185px; height: 204px;" align="left" height="110" hspace="10" vspace="10" width="98">

 <h4>At <a href="../javaone/2007/nb-day.html">NetBeans

 Day in San Francisco on May 7</a>, Charlie will be speaking

 about Ruby, JRuby, and JRuby on Rails. We asked him some questions

 about his upcoming talk, and here's what he had to say:</h4>

 <br><br><h4>Most of us know that Ruby, a single-pass interpreted

 language, is a reflective, dynamic, object-oriented programming

 language combining syntax inspired by Perl with Smalltalk-like

 object-oriented features. Plus it shares some features with Python,

 Lisp, Dylan and CLU. How does someone like yourself, someone with so

 much Ruby experience, describe Ruby?</h4>

 <br><p>That standard description works well, but I'd also describe Ruby as

 highly metaprogrammable, easy to learn, and perhaps most

 importantly...fun. It's been a long time since I found a language as

 fun to use as Ruby.</p>

 <h4>Do you see Ruby competing with languages like Java and JavaScript?

 Or would you say that Ruby is a complimentary language to Java and

 JavaScript?</h4>

 <br><p>Perhaps Ruby competes with JavaScript,

 since they're in roughly the same half of the language world (dynamic

 languages), but choosing between different dynamic languages is a bit

 like choosing between peanut butter and chocolate. People just have

 their own tastes.</p>

 <p>I'd say that Ruby and Java can be just as complimentary as Ruby and

 C are in the standard implementation. It doesn't make any more sense to

 say "always use Ruby" than it does to say "always use Java". You choose

 the best tools for the job, the ones that help you accomplish the task

 as well as possible. I think that Java and Ruby go together very well,

 a bit like chocolate and peanut butter combinations.</p>

 <h4>Why should developers be interested in Ruby?</h4>

 <br><p>Perhaps the most important reason is that Ruby gives developers a new

 way of looking at programming. It supports the same basic OO constructs

 that Java supports but presents an additional set of features that open

 a lot of developers' eyes. Of course there's also the fact that Ruby is

 a very powerful and elegant language, allowing developers to get more

 done with less code. In the end, though, it's a combination of the

 two...learning Ruby will make you a better programmer, and continuing

 to use it will probably make you more productive.</p>

 <h4>Is Ruby better for certain applications but not others? In what situations should developers consider using Ruby?</h4>

 <br><p>Ruby is a great language for the topmost layer of any

 application, tying together other libraries written in other languages

 (like Java). It works very well in that capacity, gluing together many

 libraries with a minimum of code, while providing metaprogramming

 capabilities to make those libraries easier to understand and consume.</p>

 <p>Ruby is also being used to develop "full stack" applications using

 frameworks like Ruby on Rails. Because of this, more people are

 realizing that dynamic languages like Ruby truly can be used to develop

 whole systems, and that their benefits can extend throughout the

 development process.</p>

 <h4>How would you compare Ruby and JRuby? There must be some

 differences between them. What are those differences and how

 significant are they?</h4>

 <br><p>The differences between Ruby and JRuby are largely the differences

 between writing Java code and writing native C code: Ruby exposes many

 platform-specific or low-level operations we can't support directly in

 JRuby. However the lack of those issues hasn't stopped us from running

 Rails, arguably the largest and most complicated framework yet written

 in Ruby. So the short answer is that the differences don't impact most

 users.</p>

 <h4>Can you use JRuby in the same way you use Ruby?</h4>

 <br><p>That is the ultimate goal. We're pretty close to that point, but JRuby

 may never be the best option for short-running scripts (JVM overhead

 bites us a bit here) or for when you really need those low-level

 functions. But in general any application that's "pure Ruby" should

 work just as well with JRuby as with Ruby.</p>

 <h4>Is Ruby on Rails on open-source framework for developing web applications that is built around Ruby?</h4>

 <br><p>Ruby on Rails is a full-stack web framework providing a very agile

 approach to web application development. Everybody would agree that

 Rails has changed the way we look at web development, on any platform.</p>

 <h4>What is JRuby on Rails? And how would you compare JRuby on Rails to Ruby on Rails?</h4>

 <br><p>JRuby on Rails is virtually the same as Ruby on Rails, only it has the

 further advantage of running on the Java Virtual Machine. Our goal is

 to run Rails on JRuby directly with as little modification as possible.

 Today, most "pure Ruby" Rails apps will run well on JRuby with only

 minor configuration tweaks, so we've mostly achieved that goal.</p>

 <h4>What are the main reasons developers should be interested in using JRuby on Rails?</h4>

 <br><p>JRuby on Rails will provide new, easier deployment options, more

 scalable execution, and the stability and reliability of the Java

 platform. It looks and feels like Rails (and really, just runs the same

 Rails code as Ruby on Rails), but backed by the powerful JVM and its

 massive collection of libraries.</p>

 <h4>Is JRuby on Rails better suited for certain types of applications?

 Should developers consider it for any type of web application?</h4>

 <br><p>People are using Ruby on Rails for all sorts of web applications, and

 have started to co-opt many of its component modules for non-webapps,

 too. I think the sky's the limit for what developers can accomplish

 with Rails, if they have enough imagination.</p>

 <h4>What does NetBeans 6 bring to the table for Ruby, JRuby, and JRuby on Rails?</h4>

 <br><p>NetBeans 6 will have direct support for developing Ruby and

 Rails applications, providing the "full IDE experience." That means

 code completion, refactoring, in-IDE app testing and debugging, project

 management, source control, and all the other features an IDE like

 NetBeans brings to the table for any language. Many Ruby developers

 have claimed they don't need an IDE, preferring to just use glorified

 text editors. That is, until they've seen what's possible with

 well-written Ruby support like that in NetBeans. </p>

 <h4>Why should developers use NetBeans 6 and Ruby/JRuby/JRuby on Rails?</h4>

 <br><p>NetBeans 6 is really an amazing piece of work, taking the success of

 NetBeans 5.5 and going another level beyond. I've been using it for

 day-to-day work even during the development process, and I've been

 happy with it. Plus, now that there's support for working with Ruby and

 Rails alongside Java applications, I finally have a complete IDE that

 allows me to develop in my two favorite languages. NetBeans 6 is sure

 to turn a lot of heads in the IDE world.</p>

 <p>And I think developers need to try out Ruby to really understand

 what it gives them. Never before have I used a language that made so

 many things easy while generally staying out of my way. And that's the

 mark of a good language...how much you can accomplish without banging

 your head against the wall. Ruby and Rails have accomplished a

 tremendous amount in that sense, and I'm sure we'll see many more

 innovations coming out of the Ruby world in the coming months.</p>

 <h2>Meet Charlie in San Francisco</h2>

 <p>Don't miss Charlie's talk on
 <a href="../javaone/2007/nb-day.html">NetBeans
 Day in San Francisco on May 7, 2007</a>, where he will demo
 Ruby, JRuby, and JRuby on Rails and answer your questions.</p>

 </body>
 </html>
	<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
	<html>
	<head>
	<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="../../../netbeans.css">
	<title>NetBeans Day Interview: Charlie Nutter</title>
	<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
	<meta name="author" content="Beth Stearns">
	</head>

	<body>

	<h1>NetBeans Day Speaker: Charlie Nutter Talks About Ruby, JRuby, and JRuby on Rails</h1>

	<p><br>

	<i>Charles Nutter has been a Java developer since 1996. He

	currently works full-time as a core developer on JRuby at Sun

	Microsystems. He led the open-source LiteStep project in the late 90s

	and started working on Ruby in the fall of 2004. Since then he has been

	a member of the JRuby team, helping to make it a true alternative Ruby

	platform. Charles presented JRuby at RubyConference 2005 and

	co-presented at JavaOne 2006 with Thomas Enebo. Charles blogs on Ruby

	and Java at <a href="http://headius.blogspot.com/">headius.blogspot.com</a>.</i>
	</p>
	<br>

	<h1>Charlie Nutter</h1>

	<br>

	<img src="../../../images_www/javaone/2007/cnutter.jpg" alt="Charlie Nutter" style="width: 185px; height: 204px;" align="left" height="110" hspace="10" vspace="10" width="98">

	<h4>At <a href="../javaone/2007/nb-day.html">NetBeans

	Day in San Francisco on May 7</a>, Charlie will be speaking

	about Ruby, JRuby, and JRuby on Rails. We asked him some questions

	about his upcoming talk, and here's what he had to say:</h4>

	<br><br><h4>Most of us know that Ruby, a single-pass interpreted

	language, is a reflective, dynamic, object-oriented programming

	language combining syntax inspired by Perl with Smalltalk-like

	object-oriented features. Plus it shares some features with Python,

	Lisp, Dylan and CLU. How does someone like yourself, someone with so

	much Ruby experience, describe Ruby?</h4>

	<br><p>That standard description works well, but I'd also describe Ruby as

	highly metaprogrammable, easy to learn, and perhaps most

	importantly...fun. It's been a long time since I found a language as

	fun to use as Ruby.</p>

	<h4>Do you see Ruby competing with languages like Java and JavaScript?

	Or would you say that Ruby is a complimentary language to Java and

	JavaScript?</h4>

	<br><p>Perhaps Ruby competes with JavaScript,

	since they're in roughly the same half of the language world (dynamic

	languages), but choosing between different dynamic languages is a bit

	like choosing between peanut butter and chocolate. People just have

	their own tastes.</p>

	<p>I'd say that Ruby and Java can be just as complimentary as Ruby and

	C are in the standard implementation. It doesn't make any more sense to

	say "always use Ruby" than it does to say "always use Java". You choose

	the best tools for the job, the ones that help you accomplish the task

	as well as possible. I think that Java and Ruby go together very well,

	a bit like chocolate and peanut butter combinations.</p>

	<h4>Why should developers be interested in Ruby?</h4>

	<br><p>Perhaps the most important reason is that Ruby gives developers a new

	way of looking at programming. It supports the same basic OO constructs

	that Java supports but presents an additional set of features that open

	a lot of developers' eyes. Of course there's also the fact that Ruby is

	a very powerful and elegant language, allowing developers to get more

	done with less code. In the end, though, it's a combination of the

	two...learning Ruby will make you a better programmer, and continuing

	to use it will probably make you more productive.</p>

	<h4>Is Ruby better for certain applications but not others? In what situations should developers consider using Ruby?</h4>

	<br><p>Ruby is a great language for the topmost layer of any

	application, tying together other libraries written in other languages

	(like Java). It works very well in that capacity, gluing together many

	libraries with a minimum of code, while providing metaprogramming

	capabilities to make those libraries easier to understand and consume.</p>

	<p>Ruby is also being used to develop "full stack" applications using

	frameworks like Ruby on Rails. Because of this, more people are

	realizing that dynamic languages like Ruby truly can be used to develop

	whole systems, and that their benefits can extend throughout the

	development process.</p>

	<h4>How would you compare Ruby and JRuby? There must be some

	differences between them. What are those differences and how

	significant are they?</h4>

	<br><p>The differences between Ruby and JRuby are largely the differences

	between writing Java code and writing native C code: Ruby exposes many

	platform-specific or low-level operations we can't support directly in

	JRuby. However the lack of those issues hasn't stopped us from running

	Rails, arguably the largest and most complicated framework yet written

	in Ruby. So the short answer is that the differences don't impact most

	users.</p>

	<h4>Can you use JRuby in the same way you use Ruby?</h4>

	<br><p>That is the ultimate goal. We're pretty close to that point, but JRuby

	may never be the best option for short-running scripts (JVM overhead

	bites us a bit here) or for when you really need those low-level

	functions. But in general any application that's "pure Ruby" should

	work just as well with JRuby as with Ruby.</p>

	<h4>Is Ruby on Rails on open-source framework for developing web applications that is built around Ruby?</h4>

	<br><p>Ruby on Rails is a full-stack web framework providing a very agile

	approach to web application development. Everybody would agree that

	Rails has changed the way we look at web development, on any platform.</p>

	<h4>What is JRuby on Rails? And how would you compare JRuby on Rails to Ruby on Rails?</h4>

	<br><p>JRuby on Rails is virtually the same as Ruby on Rails, only it has the

	further advantage of running on the Java Virtual Machine. Our goal is

	to run Rails on JRuby directly with as little modification as possible.

	Today, most "pure Ruby" Rails apps will run well on JRuby with only

	minor configuration tweaks, so we've mostly achieved that goal.</p>

	<h4>What are the main reasons developers should be interested in using JRuby on Rails?</h4>

	<br><p>JRuby on Rails will provide new, easier deployment options, more

	scalable execution, and the stability and reliability of the Java

	platform. It looks and feels like Rails (and really, just runs the same

	Rails code as Ruby on Rails), but backed by the powerful JVM and its

	massive collection of libraries.</p>

	<h4>Is JRuby on Rails better suited for certain types of applications?

	Should developers consider it for any type of web application?</h4>

	<br><p>People are using Ruby on Rails for all sorts of web applications, and

	have started to co-opt many of its component modules for non-webapps,

	too. I think the sky's the limit for what developers can accomplish

	with Rails, if they have enough imagination.</p>

	<h4>What does NetBeans 6 bring to the table for Ruby, JRuby, and JRuby on Rails?</h4>

	<br><p>NetBeans 6 will have direct support for developing Ruby and

	Rails applications, providing the "full IDE experience." That means

	code completion, refactoring, in-IDE app testing and debugging, project

	management, source control, and all the other features an IDE like

	NetBeans brings to the table for any language. Many Ruby developers

	have claimed they don't need an IDE, preferring to just use glorified

	text editors. That is, until they've seen what's possible with

	well-written Ruby support like that in NetBeans. </p>

	<h4>Why should developers use NetBeans 6 and Ruby/JRuby/JRuby on Rails?</h4>

	<br><p>NetBeans 6 is really an amazing piece of work, taking the success of

	NetBeans 5.5 and going another level beyond. I've been using it for

	day-to-day work even during the development process, and I've been

	happy with it. Plus, now that there's support for working with Ruby and

	Rails alongside Java applications, I finally have a complete IDE that

	allows me to develop in my two favorite languages. NetBeans 6 is sure

	to turn a lot of heads in the IDE world.</p>

	<p>And I think developers need to try out Ruby to really understand

	what it gives them. Never before have I used a language that made so

	many things easy while generally staying out of my way. And that's the

	mark of a good language...how much you can accomplish without banging

	your head against the wall. Ruby and Rails have accomplished a

	tremendous amount in that sense, and I'm sure we'll see many more

	innovations coming out of the Ruby world in the coming months.</p>

	<h2>Meet Charlie in San Francisco</h2>

	<p>Don't miss Charlie's talk on
	<a href="../javaone/2007/nb-day.html">NetBeans
	Day in San Francisco on May 7, 2007</a>, where he will demo
	Ruby, JRuby, and JRuby on Rails and answer your questions.</p>

	</body>
	</html>