Matz a.k.a Yukihiro Matsumoto a.k.a 松本行弘, creator of Ruby programming language.

Ruby is simple in appearance, but is very complex inside, just like our human body.

– Speaking on the Ruby-Talk mailing list, May 12th, 2000.

Man is driven to create; I know I really love to create things. And while I’m not good at painting, drawing, or music, I can write software.

– Foreword of Programming Ruby

No one in 1993 would have believed that an object-oriented language created by a Japanese amateur language designer would end up being used worldwide and that the language would become almost as popular as Perl. It was insane. I admit that. I didn’t believe it either…The stone has started rolling. It will became a great mountain and fill the whole earth.

– Foreword of Programming Ruby, SE

Ruby is a language designed in the following steps:

  • take a simple lisp language (like one prior to CL).
  • remove macros, s-expression.
  • add simple object system (much simpler than CLOS).
  • add blocks, inspired by higher order functions.
  • add methods found in Smalltalk.
  • add functionality found in Perl (in OO way).

So, Ruby was a Lisp originally, in theory.

Let’s call it MatzLisp from now on. ;-)

– Speaking on the Ruby-Talk mailing list, Feb 13th, 2006.

虽然有调侃的成分,但是这里还是基本忠实的说了Ruby的出身问题,对于理解Ruby语言特征有帮助。

No language can be perfect for everyone. I tried to make Ruby perfect for me, but maybe it’s not perfect for you. The perfect language for Guido van Rossum is probably Python.

The Philosophy of Ruby, a conversation with Bill Venners

这个访谈很出名,里面的一些观点对很多人,尤其是西方人的常规思维习惯造成了不小的冲击。例如Matz提到Ruby更关注人而不是机器,有人开玩笑说“节约人的时间,而不是电脑的时间”,这是高级语言对比低级语言的很重要哲学,但是Matz说的含义比这个更深入,他很强调的提出,由于图灵等价理论,几乎所有语言能完成的工作都是严格等价的,Ruby的“个性”在于强调编程者的感受,Ruby给你不同于其他语言的感受,你如果喜欢你就用,它回馈给你编程的快乐。这里Matz还承认他是Larry Wall(Perl语言的发明者)的崇拜者,Ruby受到Perl哲学的影响,相信做一件事可以应该有不一样的方法,每个人都有选择的权利。里面的精华还有不少,有兴趣的自己研究。

That indicates that he trusts himself, and not me (Ruby). And I think he’s right.

Response to the thread talking about Joel Spolsky‘s criticize to Ruby

最后这个最有趣,Joel Spolsky也是业界大牛,世界上最早开始写blog的人之一,他的blog日访问量在50万以上,可以排进全球前十(别跟我说新浪那些骗子。。。),有一次他写了一篇东西讨论“适宜的Web开发语言”(明显就是战题嘛),里面说了一些Ruby的“坏话”(其实也不算坏话),例如不成熟啦,性能不够好啦,可用资源匮乏啦,这都没啥,反正新语言的拥护者都听这些听麻木了,关键是这家伙接下去顺道吹了下他公司自己开发的一种语言Wasabi(其实本质上就是他们用来把VB Script遗留代码编译成PHP的一种技术),吹完还不过瘾,又写了一篇专门的文章介绍这个Wasabi,于是很多圈子里的大牛不爽,就出来骂他双重标准(例如Jeff Atwood),Ruby的邮件列表里自然也不会放过这个话题,发贴的人自然是义愤填膺,然后Matz出来回话,说了这么一句,真是道行深厚啊。。。估计和我一样是老庄哲学的信奉者 -_-bb