Ruby

since 1995 (earliest usage recorded on this site was 1998)

Ruby is a dynamic, reflective, general purpose object-oriented programming language that combines syntax inspired by Perl with Smalltalk-like features. Ruby originated in Japan during the mid-1990s and was initially developed and designed by Yukihiro "Matz" Matsumoto. It was influenced primarily by Perl, Smalltalk, Eiffel, and Lisp.

Ruby supports multiple programming paradigms, including functional, object oriented, imperative and reflective. It also has a dynamic type system and automatic memory management.

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Users

Technology Timeline Graph

1998

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2002

2003

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2005

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2007

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2011

2012

dabeaz

jjames

dfan

twhitton

brucehoult

asenchi

ghoseb

zellyn

jcarbaugh

enki

dasil003

Kanru

zephyrfalcon

NX172

jmillikin

soryu2

bittercoder

edd

newman

bkmontgomery

Zak

mmai

myles

adurdin

arowla

Sitwon

sbastn

ntoll

shiny

empty

kan

kovacs

growe

metavida

banterability

iamteem

tmcw

alexsuraci

kratorius

daniellindsley

greyfade

givas

binarydud

cstejerean

Ben

gtani7

adambrenecki

kevinpet

ndw

gnat

justinlilly

dmnd

nsmgr8

claytron

bitprophet

b3ng0

davisagli

davidpaccoud

gsiegman

Rolo

streetcleaner

eddymul

undoingemptyvoid

sjaekel

smalltobi

cagedmantis

durden

mrlemke

krisse2

rizumu

bseanvt

skyl

nightfly19

karlstolley

quakehead

daddy

gabrielrios

jasonb

jamesotron

mattimck

maxogden

perimosocordiae

collypops

pax

mccolgan

tswicegood

sdhamilton

CrociDB

fisadev

filipe_mp

cpharmston

mcaulay

adamv

SeanOC

thaostra

floyd

edfuh

gnubardt

moriogawa

mallipeddi

Josh

anoop

zeroaltitude

bkonkle

pejrak

gridaphobe

nnrcschmdt

dabeaz - 15 years

jjames - 15 years

dfan - 3 years

twhitton - 14 years

brucehoult - 12 years

asenchi - 12 years

ghoseb - 1 years

zellyn - 11 years

jcarbaugh - 2 years

enki - 10 years

dasil003 - 10 years

Kanru - 2 years

zephyrfalcon - 9 years

NX172 - 9 years

jmillikin - 3 years

soryu2 - 8 years

bittercoder - 8 years

edd - 8 years

newman - 8 years

bkmontgomery - 8 years

Zak - 8 years

mmai - 8 years

myles - 8 years

adurdin - 8 years

arowla - 8 years

Sitwon - 8 years

sbastn - 8 years

ntoll - 3 years

shiny - 8 years

empty - 8 years

kan - 8 years

kovacs - 8 years

growe - 7 years

metavida - 7 years

banterability - 7 years

iamteem - 7 years

tmcw - 7 years

alexsuraci - 7 years

kratorius - 1 years

daniellindsley - 7 years

greyfade - 7 years

givas - 1 years

binarydud - 3 years

cstejerean - 3 years

Ben - 7 years

gtani7 - 6 years

adambrenecki - 1 years

kevinpet - 6 years

ndw - 6 years

gnat - 6 years

justinlilly - 1 years

dmnd - 6 years

nsmgr8 - 2 years

claytron - 2 years

bitprophet - 6 years

b3ng0 - 6 years

davisagli - 1 years

davidpaccoud - 2 years

gsiegman - 1 years

Rolo - 2 years

streetcleaner - 1 years

eddymul - 6 years

undoingemptyvoid - 6 years

sjaekel - 1 years

smalltobi - 6 years

cagedmantis - 6 years

durden - 1 years

mrlemke - 3 years

krisse2 - 5 years

rizumu - 5 years

bseanvt - 5 years

skyl - 5 years

nightfly19 - 5 years

karlstolley - 5 years

quakehead - 5 years

daddy - 5 years

gabrielrios - 5 years

jasonb - 3 years

jamesotron - 5 years

mattimck - 5 years

maxogden - 5 years

perimosocordiae - 4 years

collypops - 4 years

pax - 4 years

mccolgan - 4 years

tswicegood - 4 years

sdhamilton - 4 years

CrociDB - 4 years

fisadev - 4 years

filipe_mp - 4 years

cpharmston - 4 years

mcaulay - 4 years

adamv - 4 years

SeanOC - 2 years

thaostra - 4 years

floyd - 4 years

edfuh - 3 years

gnubardt - 3 years

moriogawa - 3 years

mallipeddi - 3 years

Josh - 3 years

anoop - 3 years

zeroaltitude - 3 years

bkonkle - 3 years

pejrak - 3 years

gridaphobe - 2 years

nnrcschmdt - 1 years

jjames

1998–

I picked up Ruby before google translate and all of the documentation was in japanese. You had to put on a mining helmet and take a pick axe to the language to get any milage at all. I always assumed that had something to do with the titling of the book.

dabeaz

1998–

I'm done some work with it in the context of the Swig Ruby module. Taught it to students in a university course around 2007.

dfan

1998–2000

Neat in a lot of ways but I could never get over ending my functions with "end end end".

twhitton

1999–

I hopped on the Ruby train just as it was leaving the station. In the good old days, docs were hard to find, and the going was rough, but friendly hackers on Usenet helped me along. I still believe Ruby is the best object oriented scripting language around and use it regularly.

asenchi

2001–

Picked up Ruby on the suggestion of a friend after spending a day with Python. We wrote a small command line application together called rweather. Ended up picking up Rails and contributing to the first Rails book.

brucehoult

2001–

In April 2001 I visited Chicago. The guy I was staying with handed me the Ruby book, I handed him a Dylan book... I still prefer Perl for quick&dirty but Ruby is at least better than Python.

zellyn

2002–

The Pragmatic Programmer pushed me towards Ruby, before Rails existed. I use it now only for things like Chef/Puppet, with no clear Python alternative. And I still miss _why.

ghoseb

2002

dasil003

2003–

I first got into Ruby for sysadmin-type scripting largely because I always loved the _idea_ of Perl but never had the patience to learn it deeper. Once Rails hit the scene I discovered Ruby meta programming and haven't looked back.

jcarbaugh

2003–2004

I used this at the Treasury Department to test the web application that my company was developing. We used Ruby to scrape the site to test output and automated IE using Microsoft COM bindings.

2003–

2004–

2004–

2004–2005

2005–

I love the beauty of Ruby

edd

2005–

Got into it via Rails, powered my second startup and is still the day job

sbastn

2005–

On an off. Started with Rails and now I have been into pure Ruby since the start of 2010. Jumping from Python to Ruby is a good experience, it makes you appreciate the subtleties for both languages. Unit testing in ruby sometimes looks easier.

ntoll

2005–2007

Did some Rails when Rails was pre-1.0 and still v.small. Also helped write/maintain a chat-bot library written in Ruby. Mostly forgotten since becoming a Pythonista.

newman

2005–

My exit from PHP Hell

bkmontgomery

2005–

Tried it out as Rails was gaining steam. Actually wrote a few small command-line file-processing utilities, instead. Revisited this (and Rails) right at the end of 2011.

soryu2

2005–

A beautiful, elegant and expressive language. Period.

Zak

2005–

Rails promised to make basic web apps easy. After using it on and off for five years, I can't say I disagree. Ruby is nice for scripting *nix too.

shiny

2005–

bittercoder

2005–

Got into this language via Rails. Mostly via a few books: The Programming Ruby pickaxe book. Why's poignant guide to Ruby. A few ROR books/cookbooks. Have also used IronRuby on a few occasions, mostly a hosted script language in .Net applications (though I still prefer IronPython because it's a little more mature).

jmillikin

2005–2007

The language is pleasant enough, but its English-speaking community is hell-bent on transforming it into the new PHP. I rewrote my Ruby applications with Python, not due to any inherent attributes of either language, but simply because the general competency of Python libraries is higher.

kovacs

2005–

kan

2005–

Sitwon

2005–

Kept reading that it was the successor to Python. Quickly realized that wasn't the case.

arowla

2005–

adurdin

2005–

Currently my preferred language for shell-scripting tasks.

2005–

2005–

2006

2006–

Started using Ruby on Rails for my first full time job & haven't looked back.

growe

2006–

Haven't written much more than 'hello world' in Ruby but from what I've seen of it, it looks quite useful.

iamteem

2006–

The biggest tool in my chosen profession. That's about it.

tmcw

2006–

alexsuraci

2006–

My first language after PHP. Tackled it during the Rails frenzy. Blew my mind (more in a sense of "wtf" than "omg"). Blew it off for a while. Came full circle recently and approached it again after having Haskell, Lisps, C, etc. under my belt, and it wasn't confusing at all.

greyfade

2006–

Ruby surprised me in that it was a far more intuitive language than I would have expected. Far more of a joy to use than most other languages I knew at the time.

givas

2006

Rails

binarydud

2006–2008

cstejerean

2006–2008

Ben

2006–

I love Ruby, but I haven't used it nearly as much as I'd have liked.

banterability

2006–

daniellindsley

2006–

nsmgr8

2007–2008

After the Rails hype, tried to learn it. But perlism didn't help me going on. Moreover, my favourite, much better than Rails, Django is available. No need for Rails.

gsiegman

2007

Ruby lead me to Rails. That lead me to Django, which lead me to Python.

davidpaccoud

2007–2008

I dig inside the language to learn RoR. I then discover Python also has an amazing web framework with Django and got back to Python.

bitprophet

2007–

Picked it up when I started working at a partly-Rails shop. Could largely do without Rails but Ruby itself is a lot of fun. Community needs to document more and be smug/wacky a bit less though.

justinlilly

2007

I wrote a simple CMS for a startup in South Carolina in ruby. The (lack of) documentation of rails bit me in the ass, so I didn't get terribly far. It still reads well enough to a python eye.

sjaekel

2007

undoingemptyvoid

2007–

Using for a RAILs based product writing with non-work friends. Using Ruby is sort of buried in there and also for the Capistrano scripts. Spending some time at work-work using Ruby for fast one-off scripting tasks.

streetcleaner

2007

Evaluated it, but Python was more my style.

davisagli

2007

Spent a summer building a Rails app. It was all right; certainly nicer to work with than PHP; but I like Python better.

b3ng0

2007–

gnat

2007–

I like the language a lot. Haven't used it enough to become fluent, but it feels more natural to me than Python.

dmnd

2007–

claytron

2007–2008

Had a very brief stint supporting a Ruby on Rails app.

gtani7

2007–

I remember Matz and Dave Thomas talking at 1st OSCON in portland, then promptly forgot about it. Today certain rails plugins are critical: acts as solr/ferret/xapian, thinking sphinx, sunspot, but when i get an i7 box i'm gonna feel kinda silly

kevinpet

2007–

Rolo

2007–2008

smalltobi

2007–

Using it since I use Rails and I love it. In my opinion Ruby's expressiveness is better than Python's.

2007–

2007–

2007–

2007

Encountered along with Rails at a work experience placement. Was thrown in the deep end and didn't like it, but ultimately led me to discover Python and Django.

durden

2007

mattimck

2008–

rizumu

2008–

Did a small rails site and would like to try more again someday.

maxogden

2008–

jamesotron

2008–

I write Ruby every day. She is my newest flame, and is a seductive and busty mistress.

gabrielrios

2008–

First one that i really worked with. Hated at first, but now love it

jasonb

2008–2010

fun fun!

krisse2

2008–

nightfly19

2008–

My often abused friend and the second language I learned. Taught me how to effectively use object oriented concepts (that it's not just a bag of functions) and undid a lot of the damage the PHP ingrained in me. I actually use it where a lot of people would use Bash since I have access to every tool I need in the standard library and don't have to know AWK, and SED, whatever else to do what I want.

quakehead

2008–

This language is so beautiful it makes me cry, as if there's a big onion near my computer.

daddy

2008–

the most promising right now

karlstolley

2008–

skyl

2008–

Checked to make sure that I didn't want to invest more time in rails (instead of django). I'm not opposed to it though.

mrlemke

2008–2010

The first programming language I learned that you could make desktop software for. It really helped me break the barrier and understand programming.

bseanvt

2008–

collypops

2009–

I delved into Ruby after Python to see how Rails stacked up against Django, but until I find another use for it, I'll remain a Ruby amaetuer.

cpharmston

2009–

I dabble.

pax

2009–

mccolgan

2009–

decided to use it one day for a web scrape project. tried rails.

tswicegood

2009–

In an effort to pick up the final of the big three dynamic languages, I started learning Ruby in 2009. I feel comfortable coding in it now, but definitely wouldn't consider myself an expert by any stretch of the imagination.

sdhamilton

2009–

Used in a Rails project, like it. Can never decide what I prefer Python or Ruby. Used day to day on a linux box.

CrociDB

2009–

fisadev

2009–

Started using it on an university project. I like it, but I like more Python.

filipe_mp

2009–

I just love it and want to learn more about it *-*

perimosocordiae