Forum: Ruby Which Ruby Implementation?

I know that there are other "unofficial" Ruby implementations, like
Rubinius, jRuby, etc.

What are the advantages of one implementation over another? How do I
know which one is the most suitable for me?

On Fri, Sep 28, 2012 at 7:50 AM, Aytug G. <lists@ruby-forum.com> wrote:
> I know that there are other "unofficial" Ruby implementations, like
> Rubinius, jRuby, etc.
>
> What are the advantages of one implementation over another? How do I
> know which one is the most suitable for me?

JRuby has the advantages and disadvantages of the JVM.

Advantages:

* Best GC available for Ruby
* Optimizing native JIT
* Solid concurrency (parallel threads) and memory model
* Vast array of languages and libraries usable from Ruby
* Wide platform support (including GUI libraries)

Disadvantages:

* Slow startup/warmup
* Native features are often underimplemented (JVM hides most POSIX from 
us)
* No Ruby C extensions

And of course JRuby is still "chasing" compatibility with MRI, but
we're rapidly narrowing the gap.

- Charlie