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Innovation in the Other Camp

Markbnj

Markbnj

Elite Member <br>Moderator Emeritus
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Hey guys. I've recently been doing a lot more work in Java on Linux (Debian, at the moment) and getting into some php and python as well.

I've been an MS-oriented developer for years, and I know what cool stuff is here and in the pipeline from the language guys in Redmond. I'm speaking specifically about core evolution in the languages and available frameworks, and to some extent tool selection that drives off of that. So I put linq in the first category (love it or hate it), definitely XAML, and Expressions gets in riding XAML's coatails. Silverlight gets in too. WCF, WWF, WPF are all significant extensions to what is already a comprehensive and powerful system development framework.

My question is: what's baking on the other side? What I know about so far is Java, Swing, Jakarta, a little bit about php/python. Is there anything like XAML that really changes the way thick-client applications are built? Where do you go to keep up with the latest developments?
 
On the open source side of things, it seems that Ruby on Rails has really gone in a direction that I find very flexible and powerful, much more so then Java or php/python for web applications. Rails imposes very strict coding conventions, and by doing that it allows the developer to code applications very quickly and efficiently. The tool set that comes with Rails is also very powerful, with just a few commands and editing a couple of files you can have a completely working and functional web application in a matter of minutes, albeit rather ugly 😉. This includes generating all of your database tables, unit tests, and methods for add/update/delete/view of your data model. As long as you adhere to the naming standards and directory layout, Rails basically does ALL of the heavy lifting for you. If you follow Rails RESTful design as well then your web applications also becomes extended into XML views as well as HTML views. Which makes it very easy to combine web applications and web services using the same data models and data restrictions.

I've only been playing with it for a few days now, and there is no way I would go back to coding web applications in php.
 
I hear contradictory things about Rails. I loaded the whole platform up a year or two ago but never had time to follow up on it. Wasn't there some major defection from Rails a few months back? Someone well-known had been trying to rewrite a portal in it and gave up. I'll have to see if I can dig up the reference. But your description of it sounds interesting for sure.
 
I have no knowledge of Ruby on Rails' history. From what it seems though, lots of things were fixed/changed when Ruby 2.0 came out. I've been having a hard time finding good web resources for examples and such simply because most were written for previous versions of Ruby. I bought Agile Web Development with Rails 3rd edition and it's very helpful. My only complaint is that they sometimes have you do stuff without explaining it at first, which drives me crazy because I like to know exactly what I'm doing... but they do explain it later on or show where to find the information. It does assume that you're already familiar with Ruby, which was a drawback for me but the syntax is fairly simple and they have a great appendix that goes over the basics of Ruby.
 
Rails is pretty easy to jump into, assuming you have a good book (Agile Web Dev w/ Rails) and don't touch Rails 2.0 until you gain some experience with Rails 1.2 first.

Yup, they definitely need non-advanced Rails 2.0 books. One of them that I skimmed was 'The Rails Way', which went too in depth and assumed you already had advanced understanding of Rails 1.2

The hardest part for me has been working with some external programs that I need for my project and Prototype/Scriptaculous/Javascript.
 
Originally posted by: Markbnj
I hear contradictory things about Rails. I loaded the whole platform up a year or two ago but never had time to follow up on it. Wasn't there some major defection from Rails a few months back? Someone well-known had been trying to rewrite a portal in it and gave up. I'll have to see if I can dig up the reference. But your description of it sounds interesting for sure.
Click to expand...

Are you referring to Twitter? http://tech.slashdot.org/tech/08/05/02/1516208.shtml
 
Maybe... but this was a few months ago and was another significant defection. Very similar though.
 
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