Ruby on Rails — Why Not?
There’s a plethora of languages to choose from when starting to learn web development. As such, it’s important to consider a few factors. One is utility; how are you going to use what you’re learning? A likely case would be that one is looking to create or maintain a web application. You may, out of necessity, have to start with the language of the project you are inheriting, in which case there is little choice. Learn what you need to! However, if you’re starting fresh, you have the pick of the litter. So, Just Google it: “best dev language to start 2021”. This brings up the most popular choices of the modern era, and leads to a second factor to consider; relevance. What you invest as a learner should yield returns that apply not only to your development, but as well as to working on others’ projects and having them work on yours. This is extremely important when choosing a language to begin a journey as a web developer.
So, where does Ruby fit into all this? I myself, in Googling popular dev languages of 2021, found only 1 of the 5 top articles that made mention of it, and when researching why, found more literature concerning the ‘death’ of Ruby. The chart below shows ratings of dev languages based on programming popularity.
And we can see, there’s Ruby, unassumingly holding onto to a spot in the bottom half of these languages. So, is it relevant? Well, Nowak (2020) puts it this way: “Almost an urban legend by now, the myth of RoR’s [Ruby on Rails] demise is the product of many misconceptions…”, a positive indication of the language’s mortality. Though there still seems to be a divide, with many opting to let it be a thing of the past. I don’t have to think too hard about this argument, nor do I let myself be polarized one way or the other.
Though Ruby on Rails wouldn’t be my first choice based on the popular vote, I consider the modularity of logical theory. I know that learning one language will most certainly lend itself to the study and application of another. So I would choose first a language with more relevance. Then, I say “learn Rails? Why not!” Because, the more tools in the toolbelt, the better developer one can become. There’s also no argument to its utility considering the major web apps such as GitHub and Airbnb that are programmed in Ruby (Poradovska, 2017).
Nowak (2020) notes some downfalls of Ruby on Rails are that it can be slow in performance, where “…inexperienced devs tend to make wrong decisions when writing the code”. Also an app may face scalability issues being written in it, and there’s the idea that its maturity (Ruby itself being over 20 years old (Wikipedia, 2021)), renders it… a bit boring… However, having worked with Ruby on Rails as a junior dev, I found the MVC framework very easy to understand. There’s also, a lot of behind-the-scenes ‘magic’, such as the way Rails generates models and controllers with a simple command, that expedites the development process. And if performance isn’t an issue when creating mock applications as a learner, writing Ruby as the logical engine can be intuitive and rewarding for the beginner dev.
But alas, I don’t want to be left in the dust… Languages obviously need the support of a community; and not of the sub-cult variety. Coding in a language that few developers use or understand is not useful and may make finding resources to create and maintain applications difficult to find. Thankfully, this is not the case for Ruby. Despite its trailing popularity, Ruby still has an “active community of developers… more than willing to help you with any issues that you may encounter” (Allabarton, 2018). It seems Ruby on Rails will not be fading into obscurity any time soon.
As developers, we can ask ourselves questions related to the effectiveness of our practice. Is the time spent learning a language useful? Is it dev friendly while also having the ability to create powerful applications? Is there a wide range of literature and support from the dev community? In answering the preceding queries, it seems there is no downfall in making room for Ruby on Rails in the ol’ repertoire. So, learn Ruby?… Why not?
References:
Allabarton, R. (2018, August 2). A Complete Guide To Ruby On Rails, And Why You Should Learn It. CareerFoundry. https://careerfoundry.com/en/blog/web-development/should-i-learn-ruby-on-rails/#:~:text=Ruby%20On%20Rails%20Is%20Beginner%2DFriendly&text=Here%20are%20just%20a%20few,lines%20with%20a%20semicolon%20(%3B)
Guru99 (2021). MVC Tutorial for Beginners: What is, Architecture & Example. Guru99. https://www.guru99.com/mvc-tutorial.html#:~:text=The%20Model%2DView%2DController%20(,development%20aspect%20of%20an%20application.
Nowak, W. (2020, Feb 21). Why Ruby on Rails Is Still a Good Choice in 2021 [UPDATED]. monterail. https://www.monterail.com/blog/why-ruby-on-rails-development-2021
Poradovska, A. (2017, June 23). Famous Web Apps Built with Ruby on Rails. railsware. https://railsware.com/blog/famous-web-apps-built-with-ruby-on-rails/
Raja, A. M. (2019, March 6). Visualize Programming Language Popularity using tiobeindexpy. towards data science. https://towardsdatascience.com/visualize-programming-language-popularity-using-tiobeindexpy-f82c5a96400d
Wikipedia (2021). Ruby (programming language). Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_(programming_language)
