# What's next? **URL:** \ **Category:** IronRuby\ **Created:** [May 11, 2010, 8:16pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427 "2010-05-11T20:16:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2010, 8:16pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/1 "2010-05-11T20:16:30Z")
Hey Guys, Now that IronRuby 1.0 has shipped (congrats!!), what’s next on the docket? 🙂 I’m not trying to pressure you guys! Just excited about the future. The feature i’d love to see most would be pre-compilation… Thanks for such a great product, Martin ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 12:09am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/2 "2010-05-12T00:09:29Z")
What would you like to achieve by pre-compiling code? Faster startup time? Packaging your code in a dll instead of a bunch of .rb files? Using Ruby code statically from C#? Tomas ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 12:42am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/3 "2010-05-12T00:42:51Z")
On Wed, May 12, 2010 at 10:06 AM, Tomas M. \< [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)\> wrote: > What would you like to achieve by pre-compiling code? Faster startup time? > Packaging your code in a dll instead of a bunch of .rb files? Using Ruby > code statically from C#? Personally I’m not too fussed about using ruby statically from C# (dynamic in 4.0 solves that problem), but IMHO packaging is the big one. Even if it didn’t run any faster, I’d still use precompilation just for deployment. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 2:48am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/4 "2010-05-12T02:48:40Z")
Pre-compiling code would allow us to distribute our programs in .exe and .dll form, rather than .rb files. IronPython allows this with its pyc.py script. And if that means faster startup times and using Ruby code statically from C#, then all the better. On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 3:06 PM, Tomas M. \< ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 3:30am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/5 "2010-05-12T03:30:14Z")
Ok, that’s certainly an option to look into. I guess what people want is the ability to distribute applications and libraries in .exe and .dll form, the same way we do with C# or VB. But perhaps it’s a question of scope - maybe IronRuby is not intended to be a 1st class .NET language in the same way that C# or VB are, or it’s only intended to be a language for embedding in a static language or for unit testing purposes? The other reason is that it provides some (small) level of code obfuscation. I realize of course that the assemblies can be reverse engineered, but most users won’t bother to do that - they’ll just be interested in running the .exe. On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 6:04 PM, Tomas M. \< ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 4:15am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/6 "2010-05-12T04:15:18Z")
Why not create an executable assembly that embeds all the Ruby files as resources in the assembly? Extract them at runtime (you could probably just keep them in a memory stream), fire up a Ruby runtime host & engine, feed it the Ruby file, and away you go. Or am I missing something that would make this infeasible? – Will G. [http://hotgazpacho.org/](http://hotgazpacho.org/) ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 3:14am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/7 "2010-05-12T03:14:26Z")
Well, there is a pretty simple way how to package up .rb files into an .exe file w/o precompiling anything. One option is to build a self-extracting zip file or something like that. That would solve the deployment issue. Improving startup time via pre-compilation is much more work. Tomas From: removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid [[mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)] On Behalf Of David Escobar Sent: Tuesday, May 11, 2010 5:48 PM To: removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid Subject: Re: [Ironruby-core] What’s next? Pre-compiling code would allow us to distribute our programs in .exe and .dll form, rather than .rb files. IronPython allows this with its pyc.py script. And if that means faster startup times and using Ruby code statically from C#, then all the better. On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 3:06 PM, Tomas M. \ wrote: What would you like to achieve by pre-compiling code? Faster startup time? Packaging your code in a dll instead of a bunch of .rb files? Using Ruby code statically from C#? Tomas ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 5:28am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/8 "2010-05-12T05:28:27Z")
Will, what you are describing is the preferred way of packaging Ruby code as an exe. Someone should write a sample that shows how to do this; I believe there already is one but I don’t have the URL handy. David, the first part of your email sounded reasonable, but the 2nd part (about scope) came from left field. Please indicate why the recipe Tomas and Will explained make IronRuby any less than first-class (whatever that means =P). IronPython is also planning on doing this too, so we think it’s the best “self-contained deployment” option, but I’d like to hear why it won’t work for you. As far as the other discussed features go, let me draw a line in the sand for the next major release (let’s call it vNext for argument’s sake): 1.) It is a goal of IronRuby vNext to improve interop with .NETs type system, so we will most likely implement something like IronPython’s “clrtype” feature, and provide a library which lets you emit real static types from Ruby code. You could even imagine taking the emitted IL and writing it to a DLL, which could be called directly from a static language, but that’s lower priority. 2.) It is not a goal of IronRuby vNext to implement a static compiler for Ruby; as in we will not emit both similar types and method bodies as C#. IronRuby is a dynamic language, and any static compiler features should be part of a .NET backend for Duby (currently only a JVM backend exists). Pre-compilation is different; it involves emitting IL to a DLL that we would have emit at runtime, given every method were called. This would only help startup marginally, as we already have fast startup with the interpreter and NGEN-ing IronRuby’s binaries, and most of the time spent is actually running code, not emitting it. Also, pre-compilation doesn’t help us CLR type system interop, as it would not produce a CLI-compliant assembly; assemblies generated by pyc cannot be referenced by a C# app. As far as non-.NET[http://non-.NET](http://non-.NET) related features, we’ll be targeting Ruby 1.9 support, and running Rails 3 and other libs will focus us on what features to implement first (so 1.8.7 compat might happen despite us wanting to move directly to 1.9). FFI is another possible feature, but only if there are crucial libs that use it, or if someone contributes it. Any other features people are curious about? Now is definitely the time to voice your opinions 🙂 ~Jimmy On May 11, 2010, at 7:15 PM, “Will G.” \ wrote: Why not create an executable assembly that embeds all the Ruby files as resources in the assembly? Extract them at runtime (you could probably just keep them in a memory stream), fire up a Ruby runtime host & engine, feed it the Ruby file, and away you go. Or am I missing something that would make this infeasible? – Will G. [http://hotgazpacho.org/](http://hotgazpacho.org/)[http://hotgazpacho.org/](http://hotgazpacho.org/) On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 9:20 PM, David Escobar \<[mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid[mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)\> wrote: Ok, that’s certainly an option to look into. I guess what people want is the ability to distribute applications and libraries in .exe and .dll form, the same way we do with C# or VB. But perhaps it’s a question of scope - maybe IronRuby is not intended to be a 1st class .NET language in the same way that C# or VB are, or it’s only intended to be a language for embedding in a static language or for unit testing purposes? The other reason is that it provides some (small) level of code obfuscation. I realize of course that the assemblies can be reverse engineered, but most users won’t bother to do that - they’ll just be interested in running the .exe. On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 6:04 PM, Tomas M. \<[mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid[mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)\> wrote: Well, there is a pretty simple way how to package up .rb files into an .exe file w/o precompiling anything. One option is to build a self-extracting zip file or something like that. That would solve the deployment issue. Improving startup time via pre-compilation is much more work. Tomas From: [mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid[mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) [mailto:[mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid[mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)] On Behalf Of David Escobar Sent: Tuesday, May 11, 2010 5:48 PM To: [mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid[mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) Subject: Re: [Ironruby-core] What’s next? Pre-compiling code would allow us to distribute our programs in .exe and .dll form, rather than .rb files. IronPython allows this with its pyc.py script. And if that means faster startup times and using Ruby code statically from C#, then all the better. On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 3:06 PM, Tomas M. \<[mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid[mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)\> wrote: What would you like to achieve by pre-compiling code? Faster startup time? Packaging your code in a dll instead of a bunch of .rb files? Using Ruby code statically from C#? Tomas ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 7:09am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/9 "2010-05-12T07:09:07Z")
Charlie is really interested in having a .NET Duby backend; I started one in December but only got a simple helloworld app working. I’d like if someone else take it on, especially if they’ll be committed to it, so let me know if you need any help getting started. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 7:16am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/10 "2010-05-12T07:16:08Z")
I’d be really interested in it. I’ll email you offline to ask a few more specific questions. -Zac ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 9:26am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/11 "2010-05-12T09:26:38Z")
Jimmy, Will, The suggestions posted on here are all great - I’ll definitely give them a try. For me, I’ve gotten used to generating .exe’s and .dll’s using either compilers or packaging systems like py2exe for CPython and OCRA for MRI, and it’s been fairly straightforward on how to do it. With IronRuby, it wasn’t immediately obvious (to me) and seems to require more steps. That’s what made me wonder if maybe the scope and intention of IronRuby was limited to being an embedded language for C# and VB, rather than as a language that stands on its own - where I can write my entire application in IR and then compile or pack it up to an assembly without any dependencies on C# or VB. That’s what I meant by “first class” - hopefully that clears things up a bit. Sorry for any confusion. But anyway, thanks for all the suggestions. That answers my questions. On Tue, May 11, 2010 at 8:24 PM, Jimmy S. \< ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 6:58am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/12 "2010-05-12T06:58:35Z")
I believe the example for embedding the assemblies to create a .exe that you’re looking for is: [GitHub - rifraf/IronRubyEmbeddedApps: This repository shows how to create 'standalone' .Net applications written in Ruby.](http://github.com/rifraf/IronRubyEmbeddedApps) I think my main interests would be 1.9 support and a .NET duby backend which I might need to talk to Charlie about :). -Zac ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 5:00pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/13 "2010-05-12T17:00:58Z")
Personally, I’d like to see integration into VS. What is everyone using to edit their IronRuby code? ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 4:13pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/14 "2010-05-12T16:13:32Z")
I don’t know if I get much of a say, but I would vote for 1.8.7 / 1.9 support and better interop with CLR types. So pretty much what Jimmy said. –Alex ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 6:15pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/15 "2010-05-12T18:15:56Z")
Vim 😉 While it would be nice to have something like the IronPython Tools for Visual Studio - [IronPython.net / Tools](http://ironpython.net/tools/) - I’d rather see IronRuby pass more of RubySpec, get more standard libraries, like OpenSSL, implemented (I know, I know, patches are welcome), and fix some critical bugs, like the one that prevents upgrading RubyGems via `gem up --system` (which in turn prevents the easy use of cool libs like Bundler). I personally think that 1.8.7 is a better goal than 1.9.1; I’ve heard some prominent Ruby community members like Yehuda K. complain about 1.9.1 on Twitter. – Will G. [http://hotgazpacho.org/](http://hotgazpacho.org/) ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 8:35pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/16 "2010-05-12T20:35:17Z")
You guys have hit the nail on the head for me I actually want it for both reasons: to provide some loose protection for our code and to improve startup times. I was thinking about doing something around packaging like you guys were talking about, but i think then I’d have to redefine Kernel.require to make sure that all the require statements execute properly. For code protection, it only provided small benefits (a determined code stealer would easily circumvent the protections), but if it helped with startup times that would benefit us greatly. The issue is that we use IR for our UI layer so the first time they ask for any dialog it needs to compile quite a bit of code so the first time they load a dialog can take some time. I’ve thought of changing this so we do the compilation at startup but i’m not quite sure if that will work. I’d envision something like this: 1. set compilation threshold to 0 (compile immediately) 2. execute “require ‘file’” for each ruby script 3)set compilation threshold to 1 so eval doesn’t compile everything (we semi-extensively use eval) Would something like this be possible? Is the compilation threshold settable dynamically? Thanks in advance, Martin ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 9:09pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/17 "2010-05-12T21:09:14Z")
Vim ☺ From: removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid [[mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)] On Behalf Of Will G. Sent: Wednesday, May 12, 2010 9:14 AM To: removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid Subject: Re: [Ironruby-core] What’s next? Vim 😉 While it would be nice to have something like the IronPython Tools for Visual Studio - [IronPython.net / Tools](http://ironpython.net/tools/) - I’d rather see IronRuby pass more of RubySpec, get more standard libraries, like OpenSSL, implemented (I know, I know, patches are welcome), and fix some critical bugs, like the one that prevents upgrading RubyGems via `gem up --system` (which in turn prevents the easy use of cool libs like Bundler). I personally think that 1.8.7 is a better goal than 1.9.1; I’ve heard some prominent Ruby community members like Yehuda K. complain about 1.9.1 on Twitter. – Will G. [http://hotgazpacho.org/](http://hotgazpacho.org/) On Wed, May 12, 2010 at 10:58 AM, Thomas Gagne \ wrote: Personally, I’d like to see integration into VS. What is everyone using to edit their IronRuby code? * * * Ironruby-core mailing list removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid[mailto:removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) [http://rubyforge.org/mailman/listinfo/ironruby-core](http://rubyforge.org/mailman/listinfo/ironruby-core) ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 9:33pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/18 "2010-05-12T21:33:13Z")
vim 🙂 > **[GitHub - casualjim/dot-files: A collection of configuration scripts for emacs...](https://github.com/casualjim/dot-files)** > > A collection of configuration scripts for emacs and vim - GitHub - casualjim/dot-files: A collection of configuration scripts for emacs and vim * * * Met vriendelijke groeten - Best regards - Salutations Ivan Porto C. Web: [http://whiterabbitconsulting.eu](http://whiterabbitconsulting.eu) - [http://flanders.co.nz](http://flanders.co.nz) Twitter: [http://twitter.com/casualjim](http://twitter.com/casualjim) Author of IronRuby in Action ([http://manning.com/carrero](http://manning.com/carrero)) Microsoft IronRuby/C# MVP ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2010, 10:01pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/19 "2010-05-12T22:01:54Z")
How long does it take to require all the files you need? Do you use installed IronRuby v1.0 binaries for .NET 4.0 or do you build IronRuby yourself? Can you be specific about what you’re requiring? Tomas ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/278dde/32.png) [@Martin\_Smith](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_Smith)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2010, 12:27am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/whats-next/188427/20 "2010-05-13T00:27:41Z")
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