Railsconf Europe 2006 part 4: wrap-up

24 Sep 2006 21:59 - (0) comments

The last speaker at Railsconf was Dave Thomas. He fiercly dismissed all arguments used as FUD about Rails.

Static typing in Java is supposed to catch bugs early and prevent runtime Errors.
But Java is dynamically typed as well. You have to cast objects when iterating a List (before Tiger) and runtime Errors still occur: IndexOutOfBoundsExceptions, IllegalArgumentExceptions, NullPointerExceptions.
Actually NullPointers don't occur in Ruby because nil is an object.

Ruby is supposed to be slow. Ruby has slower but smarter algorithms. Active record is faster than Hibernate. Java guru Justin Gehtlandt's Rails application was quicker than the one he build in Java. And if Ruby is still not fast enough, write it yourself.

Ruby is suspposed to be hard to find Ruby programmers.
Ask any group of Java developers: "Who wants to write ruby?".

Dave concluded with some great advice: "Be edgy, take risks. You can't compete on risk with the IBM's".

I had a great time at Railsconf Europe. It was an inspiring conference with a positive vibe.
All plenary speeches have been video tape. The videos will be made available for downloads.