I’ve been a [Borland, Inprise, CodeGear] Delphi programmer for a
baker’s dozen years.
I’m looking into 3rdRail (Borland/CodeGear’s new RoR IDE) as a
possible “replacement” for Delpi 2006 in a warehouse project I’m
working on.
My main concern is that RoR may not be speedy enough to do what this
project calls for.
For those familar with Delphi, the current prototype I’ve built uses
MIDAS technology (multiple thin clients, one server app which
interacts directly with the database and is the message dispatcher for
all the clients).
Besides the database reads, inserts, and updates the clients need to
do (actual the clients tell the server to do them, and it does), there
is “a lot” of socket traffic going on–messages being passed from a
realtime system to the server app, which then dispatches them to the
appropriate client, and messages from the clients to the server, then
dispatched to the realtime.
The messages need to be fast and reliable, of course. Just what I mean
by “fast” is, admittedly, rather vague.
Is anybody “out there” (in here?) doing something similar with RoR?
Would y’all recommend Ruby’s built-in socket support, or the
“ActiveMessaging” I’ve heard about but as of yet know nothing about?
I’ll check back here from time to time, but feel free to email me
direct at: [email protected]
Clay Shannon wrote:
I’ve been a [Borland, Inprise, CodeGear] Delphi programmer for a
baker’s dozen years.
Hi, Clay. Apologies out of the way, first as I’m not going to attempt to
answer your question in terms of the relative performance of Rails for
the simple reason that I don’t have that information at hand… 
However, if you need any more generalized help in moving from Delphi to
Ruby (and from Ruby to Rails), feel free to get in touch. Delphi was my
principal programming language/environment for over 10 years and I used
to write the monthly Delphi programming column for PC Plus magazine in
the UK for all of ten years. I now work mainly in C# and Ruby as I am a
developer of the ‘Ruby in Steel’ Ruby and Rails IDE for Visual Studio.
If you are new to the Ruby language you may find my free ebook, The
Little Book Of Ruby, might be of some use. Download here:
http://www.sapphiresteel.com/The-Little-Book-Of-Ruby
If you have any specific questions about the Ruby language or the Rails
framework (apart from the performance issues which, as I said, I am not
qualified to comment on), by all means get in touch via the contacts
page on our site. Having migrated from Delphi to Ruby, I probably have a
few ideas of the things that may attract you and the things that may (at
first) seem totally baffling. The fact of the matter is that Ruby, at
first sight, looks a lot like Delphi but it is, in fact, a totally
diffeerent kettle of fish.
best wishes
Huw C.
SapphireSteel Software
Ruby and Rails In Visual Studio
http://www.sapphiresteel.com
Clay Shannon wrote:
I’ve been a [Borland, Inprise, CodeGear] Delphi programmer for a
baker’s dozen years.
Clay,
I’m an old Delphi guy also and am using 3rdRail for Ruby/Rails
development. Where are you in the US? I just got back last week from
the Lone Star Ruby Conference in Austin, Texas. It was a great
conference and let me pretty jazzed about Ruby development.
It is possible to write a test project in a short period of time and
test Ruby’s performance. That’s where I’d start. Also, keep in mind
that Ruby is also a “glue” language. You could port the socket code to
Free Pascal, run it on any O/S, and bind it in with your Ruby code.
You might consider contacting James Edward G. II and getting his
advice. He had a session on “glue” language techniques at the
conference.
With Regard,
Cody S.
Hello Cody,
<<I’m an old Delphi guy also>>
I recognize your name, too.
<<Where are you in the US?>>
I’ve lived in 8 states and hale from northern California, but am
currently in Wisconsin.
Thanks for your thoughts–I’ll continue examining Ruby under my loupe.
I just hope her last name isn’t Goldberg.
Thanks, Huw; yes, I recognize your name from the Delphi “world”
I’ll download your book and czech out your site, too.
The “powers that be” at work are all of a sudden hot on the idea of
turning our project into a web-based type of thing. The closest I’ve
gotten to web programming is IntraWeb (very Delphiesque, as you
probably know), and so there are a whole lot of new concepts I will
have to wrap my head around to really grok all of this RoR stuff.
BTW, is Collingbourne a common name where you are? My mother’s maiden
name was Kollenborn, and is exceedingly/vanishingly rare - the only
groupings of them I’ve been able to find are in Romanshorn,
Switzerland, and the cemetery in tiny little Avila, Missouri.
–Clay
Clay Shannon wrote:
Thanks, Huw; yes, I recognize your name from the Delphi “world”
Ah, my infamy gets around 
The “powers that be” at work are all of a sudden hot on the idea of
turning our project into a web-based type of thing. The closest I’ve
gotten to web programming is IntraWeb (very Delphiesque, as you
probably know), and so there are a whole lot of new concepts I will
have to wrap my head around to really grok all of this RoR stuff.
You will find Ruby On Rails quite a different experience from Delphi.
For one thing, it ain’t ‘visual’ - well, until we release our Visual
Rails Workbench real soon now, that is… 
There are other big differences (yikes, no type declaraions!) which will
creep up on you over time. As I said, if you have any questions, feel
free to get in touch.
BTW, is Collingbourne a common name where you are?
Nope, not at all. We are believed to have come across to Britain with
William The Conquerer, but I wasn’t there at the time so can’t verify
that There are a couple of villages called Collingbourne Kingston
and Collingboure Ducis but very few people with the surname…
best wishes
Huw
SapphireSteel Software
Ruby and Rails In Visual Studio
http://www.sapphiresteel.com