Dave gets +1 awesome on the "missing the java boat" point. Same deal here.
Ruby is a great language. Rails is a great framework. There's no rule that says that this technology CAN'T go away, but the trend with Ruby/Rails has been "explosive growth" for the last five years or so. I've personally been working with it for three years, and just got offered a job today as a Rails developer. >From a business/career perspective, I advocate technology "agnosticism" as far as what you can work with - David Kahn's points about taking TDD, "DRY", ORM and other concepts into new languages/ stacks holds very very true. However, you're totally welcome in IT to have preferences. Some people prefer Microsoft over *nix/open source. Some prefer Cisco over Brocade. Some one might prefer shoulda over Test::Unit. Neither is necessarily "right" or "wrong" - they all have their place. Knowing when to use which technology platform and how to implement it is the key. Rails is a tool in the tool box. Nothing more. Nothing less. Learn to use various tools for various jobs. For web applications development, Rails just happens to be the best tool I've found for the job. But maybe some one prefers the "grip" of merb or sinatra better - no problem! The point isn't so much about which is the "one true faith" so-to-speak, but about knowing the strengths and weaknesses of all of them, and the proper business and technical use cases for each. >From a career growth/job availability perspective, let me just tell you this: I'm basically what you'd call a "mid level" developer. I'm 28, been working as a web applications developer for 9 years this winter, have no *formal* training in OOP methodologies or design. I put my resume up on dice.com as a searchable resume only three weeks ago. My phone has been ringing with NEW calls from recruiters all over the United States to the tune of anywhere from 3 to 10 different jobs being thrown at me as potentials every day. And that's only looking at Washington DC, Denver, CO and Austin, TX. In spite of targeting those places, I'm getting calls from recruiters in San Francisco, LA, New York, and others as well. On Thursday of last week I interviewed for a position. It was offered in writing today (Monday). Less than a week from interview to offer, and I'll probably start next week (still nailing down a few details). That's my personal experience with RoR as a career choice for technology platform :) There DEFINITELY is growth in the Ruby/Rails space, and a lot of very large, important platforms are built on an RoR stack. My personal prediction is that this technology will be around for a while. It's going to take a decade or more to rival the popularity of .NET or Java, if it ever does (and I don't think it ever will, lacking major corporate backing like Sun/Oracle or Microsoft), but I see it becoming as popular as PHP/Drupal and similar stacks in the future. On Aug 2, 9:07 am, Dave Aronson <[email protected]> wrote: > On Mon, Aug 2, 2010 at 01:15, Musdev Musdev <[email protected]> wrote: > > DO you guys see Ruby and Ruby on Rails sticking around for a while? and > > do you see an increase in demand for ruby/ruby on rails developers? > > I definitely see an increase over the past several years. Pretty much > can't help it with something new, unless it sucks horribly (and > doesn't have huge marketing muscle or government requirements behind > it). > > Will it stick around, is another question. Another framework could > some along that would make RoR look horrible by comparison. Rails 3 > could suck horribly. (Though even then, we'd still have Rails 2 to > use.) My crystal ball is in the shop. > > I'm sure hoping it sticks around, though. I kinda missed the boat > with Java -- learned it in about 1998 or so, but didn't row hard > enough to get much work in it. Now it seems like 95% of the openings > are in Java, but I don't have the several years of experience most of > them demand, while kids who will work for half my salary are coming > out of school with at least solid training. I don't want to miss the > boat with Ruby, either by my not rowing hard enough to catch it, or by > it sinking. (I'll dispense with the obvious Khayyam pun.) > > -Dave > > -- > Specialization is for insects. -RAH | Have Pun, Will Babble! -me > Programming Blog:http://codosaur.us| Work:http://davearonson.com > Leadership Blog: http://dare2xl.com| Play:http://davearonson.net > * * * * * WATCH THIS SPACE * * * * * | Ruby:http://mars.groupsite.com -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Ruby on Rails: Talk" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rubyonrails-talk?hl=en.
