

Rubymotion – Myth, Magic, or The Future? - octopus
http://bostonrb.org/presentations/rubymotion-%E2%80%93-myth-magic-or-the-future

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pdenya
I don't hate objective c / XCode nearly enough to pursue a solution like this
even though I like and appreciate ruby. In my opinion the only way this would
be the future is if apple started providing support for it.

~~~
ryan_f
I agree also. I primarily work in Ruby but was pleasantly surprised with the
updates for iOS 5. ARC support and the addition of storyboards really helped
with the parts I disliked working with.

The only issue is that I would prefer to work with another editor. XCode just
doesn't have some of the editor features I am used to with other IDEs.

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Aykroyd
Oddly, I didn't run away from Objective-C and Xcode screaming. But I have run
screaming away from Ruby on Rails a number of times. I do acknowledge that
this is likely a personal shortcoming though.

~~~
Derbasti
Ruby is cool. REPLs are cool. Objective-C is slightly weird. Interface builder
is kind of nice. XCode is weird, but has some fairly great features for
Objective-C/Cocoa.

But Cocoa is the thing you have to learn no matter what. To be honest, all
things considered I would rather put up with Objective-C than lose Interface
Builder and the niceties of XCode.

And I say that even though I have used and love PyQt. Cocoa is so deeply
married with Objective-C and XCode, I can't really see the point of using
RubyMotion.

~~~
evilduck
You don't strictly have to lose interface builder to use RubyMotion, you can
use XIBs with Motion, but [for now] addressing elements in the XIB requires a
little bit of ugly manual mapping of the numerical XIB element ids to names
you want to give them in Motion.

Disclaimer: I've not built anything extensive with Rubymotion/IB, but I have
built a proof of concept. I don't know if it's really feasible on a large
project.

Also, Obj-C and Ruby share many common concepts, using Cocoa from RubyMotion
usually requires just a bit of syntax swapping, "vanilla" RubyMotion is not
much of an abstraction.

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jcizzle
This fear of learning a new tool, language or API boggles my mind.

The insight alone from seeing a new corner of the programming world is worth
biting the bullet and learning something new.

~~~
thibaut_barrere
I think your comment is great, and equally applies to experienced Objective-C
developers who could miss something interesting here :)

~~~
jcizzle
Good point, although, an experienced Objective-C developer can already write
iOS apps - learning Ruby in the context of backend development would probably
be more beneficial. It'd be like asking Michael Jordan to play basketball
left-handed instead of playing baseball.

~~~
thibaut_barrere
Former .Net/Java developers were already able to write backend apps before
Rails started growing, yet there was a fairly large exodus at some point.

Similarly, I'm making the quick bet that we will see a interesting number of
experienced Obj-C developers move to RubyMotion! (well, as someone who is on
the RubyMotion list, I can tell some have already started).

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patricksroberts
I think one of the most interesting points about the presentation is the
BubbleWrap libraries. The greatest pain I've felt with iOS development are
some of the terrible APIs. The amount of ceremony needed to Parse JSON from a
web based API request or to access the camera is almost absurd.

~~~
jcizzle
Well, here are two short snippets on how to do that. It is incredibly easy.
(Sorry, I couldn't find a better paste it host.)

<http://paste.org/53022>

~~~
patricksroberts
Alternately, here's BubbleWrap on camera:
<https://github.com/rubymotion/BubbleWrap#camera>

on JSON: <https://github.com/rubymotion/BubbleWrap#json>

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Skywing
Storyboards are just XML. I wonder if it'd be possible to write an HTML/JS-
based Storyboard builder and viewer? I wonder if it'd be possible to somehow
get the iOS emulator software working "in the cloud", similar to how maybe
browserling.com does their VNC-ish stuff? Wish these two things in place, I
don't think it'd be too outlandish to be able to replace xcode with a more
Linux SSH-based workflow for iOS dev, in the same vein as cloud9 IDE or
something. I personally know that I'd love to get back to working from my
Windows machine and just editing my code with Eclipse over SFTP, with my code
on my linux vps. I have not turned on my $2000 Windows gaming rig in like a
month since I started getting into iphone dev. :(

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rubyrescue
This actually tracks w/ my experiences using MacRuby.

The REPL is kind of cool, but then he doesn't remember how to set the label
text. There's no statement completion or help for him in the console, so he
gives up. He's stuck. He'll spend way more time reading docs and figuring out
Cocoa method sigs than just learning the XCode toolset and discovering methods
in the editor.

That said, overall it's a good talk and I applaud his efforts at explaining
the tool - I just think it's not clear RubyMotion is a net positive in terms
of productivity.

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AYBABTME
I refuse to hammer this nail with a hammer. I will use a screwdriver. I will
go through great difficulties if need be, so that I can keep on using a
screwdriver.

~~~
batgaijin
Are you saying use the right tool for the problem, or that there is only one
tool per problem?

If you are saying the former, I agree entirely. If you are claiming the
secondary, than I have to ask what do you think the purpose of a language like
Lua is? Why do programmers like using Lua in combination with their c/c++
projects?

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maroonblazer
The challenge isn't Xcode or Objective-C but rather the Cocoa Touch API. At
the end of the day you still need to contend with the API, no matter which
framework you use.

~~~
Nicole060
This isn't about avoiding a challenge but about the comfort of using a modern
language. Objective C still has you writing headers files for heaven's sake.

