It’s been eight months since I met Ruby for the first time. I feel like I’m spoiled as a programmer now. But, honestly, sometimes I just take it for granted. I thought I’d take a mental trip back in time to the days when I was a PHP programmer and recall what I was amazed by.

December 2005
setting: sitting in front of a warm fireplace in Columbus, Ohio

“This book is so cool,” referring to Agile Web Development with Rails. “It’s so amazing that these high level operations are really all you have to think about. It’s like I can actually think conceptually and write code at the same time. These scaffold generators are cool, but I don’t really understand how they work. And what’s this iterator thing all about.”

March 2006
setting: sitting on a warm balcony in Orlando, Florida

“This book is so cool,” referring to Agile Web Development with Rails. “I wish I finally understood how all of this testing stuff works. Those Ruby on Rails podcasts are intense. Those people on that program are intense. What’s all this about meta-programming? Oh, well, one of these days. But until then, at least I’ve got an enterprise app under my belt. This would have taken me three times as long in PHP.”

July 2006
setting: sitting on a warm porch in Lewis Center, Ohio

“This book is so cool,”
referring to Agile Web Development with Rails. “These Ajax Scaffold Generators are so cool. I just built a time-tracker for my new company in a day. It’s nice that Rails has built in support for Ajax. I remember wondering in PHP how the heck would I do that all too often. I’ve got to finally read Rails Recipes. I just hate reading pdfs. But now I’ve finally got it in a book.

October 2006
setting: sitting in my warm office in Lewis Center, Ohio

“This book is so cool,”
referring to Agile Web Development with Rails. “I can’t wait for the second edition to come out on paper. I should really read that testing chapter again. I wish test fixtures weren’t so brittle. One of these days I’ll understand it better….”