Ruby nuby and mailing lists

Ruby
1

  1. rubynuby.org seems to be down. Am I the only one having problems
    accessing it?

  2. I was at rubynuby.org because I was looking for a beginners’ Ruby
    mailing list to which I could direct a friend (something perhaps
    equivalent to the perl-beginners list, but for Ruby). I haven’t been
    able to find one anywhere else. Is there such an animal (perhaps a
    duck)?

  3. My signature is chosen randomly by a utility called “signify”. I
    swear I didn’t pick that sig block specifically for this message.
    Really.

2

Chad P. wrote:

  1. rubynuby.org seems to be down. Am I the only one having problems
    accessing it?

I’m getting:

Application error

Rails application failed to start properly"

  1. I was at rubynuby.org because I was looking for a beginners’ Ruby
    mailing list to which I could direct a friend (something perhaps
    equivalent to the perl-beginners list, but for Ruby). I haven’t been
    able to find one anywhere else. Is there such an animal (perhaps a
    duck)?

This list is open to all levels of Rubyists, including newbies. While
there was at one time talk of splitting off a newbie list, the
conclusion (I believe) was: who better to help the newbies than the
people on this list?

  1. My signature is chosen randomly by a utility called “signify”. I
    swear I didn’t pick that sig block specifically for this message.
    Really.

Mmmm.

-Justin

3

On Wed, Jul 26, 2006 at 08:34:42AM +0900, Justin C. wrote:

Chad P. wrote:

  1. rubynuby.org seems to be down. Am I the only one having problems
    accessing it?

I’m getting:

Application error

Rails application failed to start properly"

Same here.

people on this list?
Warning: this is going to be long-ish and rambling.

I have been on and off this list since I first heard of Ruby a couple
years ago. I seem to recall there being more newbie-friendly traffic on
it last time than this time around. What I’m seeing is a very high
density of discussion that, aside from solving installation problems,
would be mostly gibberish to a newbie.

One of the benefits of a newbie list (as I’ve discovered from offering
what knowledge I have on the perl-beginners lists) is that almost all
the traffic is something from which someone new to programming can
learn. It’s a little disappointing for me to not have that option for
something to offer to a new Rubyist. In fact, it’s a little
disappointing for my sake as well: I learn a lot about Perl from
thinking
about how to answer some of the questions others ask, even when they get
answered by someone else before I get around to it.

This list clearly has the level of traffic to support more than one
list. In fact, the high traffic is the reason I periodically
unsubscribe: when Ruby falls off the top of my priority list from time
to time, I start needing the inbox space again. This isn’t a complaint
about the list, but it does make me think that a Ruby newbie list might
be a good idea.

I guess I must have missed the previous discussion of a potential Ruby
list for newbies, or I might have supported the idea. Then again, maybe
not: at the time, I didn’t have any experience with newbie programming
lists, and didn’t know what was missing.