6 ms·

I think you’re overthinking this. The vast majority of Ruby/Python programmers have been installing their own copies themselves, because Apple was pretty slow i

by Gaelan 7y ago

I think you’re overthinking this. The vast majority of Ruby/Python programmers have been installing their own copies themselves, because Apple was pretty slow in updating them (Ruby is usually a few minor releases behind, Python is still 2.7 IIRC). People will just keep doing that, and nothing will change. They may or may not be moving off Unix, but this isn’t evidence of that.

indigo747 7y ago
As a counter-anecdote, the built in Ruby interpreter in Mac OS X Tiger was the way I learned to program and how I got interested in programming. I don't think a bare Ruby interpreter is the best way to get into programming, but Apple hasn't been great at encouraging programming among kids. As a kid, its development tools were totally baffling, where Ruby was much easier to understand.
- oarsinsync 7y ago
  > Apple hasn't been great at encouraging programming among kids You should check out what they’ve been doing for years with Swift Playgrounds on the iPad
  - bnt 7y ago
    But that's teaching a new generation of coders a set of tools designed only for Apple. Ruby (Python etc) are open and easily available on other platforms, Swift may be in the future but it isn't now.
    - ash_gti 7y ago
      How about using a web browser with JavaScript? Maybe not the best language for someone new but its widely available.
      - gridlockd 7y ago
        How about just a web browser? You can run almost any language from a web browser these days: https://repl.it/languages/ https://repl.it/languages/ A lot of educational sites offer embedded interpreters like this. It has never been easier to start to learn programming. The real challenge nowadays is maintaining attention...
    - willyt 7y ago
      Swift is open and available on other platforms. I can install it on a raspberry pi if I want. https://swiftreviewer.com/2018/12/21/swift-programming-on-raspberry-pi-part-2-3/ https://swiftreviewer.com/2018/12/21/swift-programming-on-ra...
    - schrodinger 7y ago
      Once you’ve learned one programming language, it’s not hard to learn a second. It’s not terribly important what you’re first language is, and Swift isn’t a bad starting point anyway.
    - swebs 7y ago
      Huh? You can download Ubuntu builds right on their site https://swift.org/download/ https://swift.org/download/
    - goalieca 7y ago
      Funny. I learned on qbasic and I remember they were teaching dr racket at ubc to first year students. They were teaching java when I was in engineering and my career has basically gotten zero Mileage from that stinking heap of uncollected garbage.
- sciencerobot 7y ago
  One of the things that drew me to Macs as I started to learn programming in '05 was that I could simply open any macbook and type python/ruby/perl and write some code.
  - Fnoord 7y ago
    Different time. Now you got Homebrew
    - pdpi 7y ago
      Which installs itself based on the system Ruby. Will be interesting to see how that plays out.
      - Fnoord 7y ago
        They just pack a statically compiled Ruby interpreter with Homebrew. Not very complex or novel. Disadvantage: install becomes more bloated (larger size).
        pdpi 7y ago
        Sure, it’s not a hard engineering challenge. However, installation instructions right now are as simple as “run this one-liner on your terminal”. That’ll have to materially change.
        Fnoord 7y ago
        > Sure, it’s not a hard engineering challenge. However, installation instructions right now are as simple as “run this one-liner on your terminal”. That’ll have to materially change. It could just as well still remain a one-liner. Every system Homebrew is installed on has Bash installed (not the latest, but still). Instead of > /usr/bin/ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)" https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/in... It could become > curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/in... | bash With the install script containing a payload containing the current Ruby script plus a Ruby interpreter. Still a "one liner".
- crazysim 7y ago
  Swift Playground for macOS? One can hope!
  - comex 7y ago
    Technically Xcode has supported Playgrounds since before the iOS app existed, though if you mean the teaching content, it doesn't have that.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- peterburkimsher 7y ago
  I had the opposite experience with AppleScript - the development tool (Script Editor) was simple enough for me to understand that it was the way I taught myself to program when I was 13. (OK, I learned Logo in school when I was 7, but programming became way more interesting when I discovered AppleScript's APIs to control all the programs on my Mac).
- coldtea 7y ago
  >As a counter-anecdote, the built in Ruby interpreter in Mac OS X Tiger was the way I learned to program and how I got interested in programming And you think a one-click download and install of Ruby would have prevented that? Not to mention Apple also has Swift, and Swift Playgrounds and so on for kids these days.
- firecall 7y ago
  Sure... but that was then. I too had a real hard time learning Ruby back in the day. But now if you google any Ruby or Rails how-tos they will include a one-line Brew and RBENV install. So I get what you are saying but I think we are in a new world here.
wyclif 7y ago
Right, I think most developers know that it's a bad idea to mess with the old, unmaintained system versions of Python, Ruby, or Perl. Almost everyone I know uses Homebrew to install the bleeding edge versions separately, and that will save you a world of pain. For Python folks, just install pyenv/pipenv and you can easily maintain `system` (Python), Python2.7x, Python3.7.3, &c as separate environments. For Ruby people it's rbenv.
- ende 7y ago
  Or anaconda!
blablabla123 7y ago
And it's to be appreciated. When installing my own Python version, I'm worried it might interfere with system tools that might be written in it.
ken 7y ago
This alone isn't evidence of that, but it's not the only data point we have. We've got 20 years of observations. They dropped X11 (and didn't use it for the main display in the first place), created new process APIs (like GCD and background tasks), deprecated standard libraries like OpenGL (and don't support Vulkan), designed their own programming language, etc. All of these point in the same direction. What will be left? Will it still be "Unix" in any meaningful sense just for having a C compiler and running an old version of Bash? Microsoft Windows did that, too.
- lone_haxx0r 7y ago
  > They dropped X11 You don't have to be anti-unix to do that though, any reasonable organization would have done the same. I agree with the rest though.

by Gaelan 7y ago

indigo747 7y ago

As a counter-anecdote, the built in Ruby interpreter in Mac OS X Tiger was the way I learned to program and how I got interested in programming. I don't think a bare Ruby interpreter is the best way to get into programming, but Apple hasn't been great at encouraging programming among kids. As a kid, its development tools were totally baffling, where Ruby was much easier to understand.

oarsinsync 7y ago
> Apple hasn't been great at encouraging programming among kids You should check out what they’ve been doing for years with Swift Playgrounds on the iPad
- bnt 7y ago
  But that's teaching a new generation of coders a set of tools designed only for Apple. Ruby (Python etc) are open and easily available on other platforms, Swift may be in the future but it isn't now.
  - ash_gti 7y ago
    How about using a web browser with JavaScript? Maybe not the best language for someone new but its widely available.
    - gridlockd 7y ago
      How about just a web browser? You can run almost any language from a web browser these days: https://repl.it/languages/ https://repl.it/languages/ A lot of educational sites offer embedded interpreters like this. It has never been easier to start to learn programming. The real challenge nowadays is maintaining attention...
  - willyt 7y ago
    Swift is open and available on other platforms. I can install it on a raspberry pi if I want. https://swiftreviewer.com/2018/12/21/swift-programming-on-raspberry-pi-part-2-3/ https://swiftreviewer.com/2018/12/21/swift-programming-on-ra...
  - schrodinger 7y ago
    Once you’ve learned one programming language, it’s not hard to learn a second. It’s not terribly important what you’re first language is, and Swift isn’t a bad starting point anyway.
  - swebs 7y ago
    Huh? You can download Ubuntu builds right on their site https://swift.org/download/ https://swift.org/download/
  - goalieca 7y ago
    Funny. I learned on qbasic and I remember they were teaching dr racket at ubc to first year students. They were teaching java when I was in engineering and my career has basically gotten zero Mileage from that stinking heap of uncollected garbage.
sciencerobot 7y ago
One of the things that drew me to Macs as I started to learn programming in '05 was that I could simply open any macbook and type python/ruby/perl and write some code.
- Fnoord 7y ago
  Different time. Now you got Homebrew
  - pdpi 7y ago
    Which installs itself based on the system Ruby. Will be interesting to see how that plays out.
    - Fnoord 7y ago
      They just pack a statically compiled Ruby interpreter with Homebrew. Not very complex or novel. Disadvantage: install becomes more bloated (larger size).
      - pdpi 7y ago
        Sure, it’s not a hard engineering challenge. However, installation instructions right now are as simple as “run this one-liner on your terminal”. That’ll have to materially change.
        Fnoord 7y ago
        > Sure, it’s not a hard engineering challenge. However, installation instructions right now are as simple as “run this one-liner on your terminal”. That’ll have to materially change. It could just as well still remain a one-liner. Every system Homebrew is installed on has Bash installed (not the latest, but still). Instead of > /usr/bin/ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)" https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/in... It could become > curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/in... | bash With the install script containing a payload containing the current Ruby script plus a Ruby interpreter. Still a "one liner".
crazysim 7y ago
Swift Playground for macOS? One can hope!
- comex 7y ago
  Technically Xcode has supported Playgrounds since before the iOS app existed, though if you mean the teaching content, it doesn't have that.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
peterburkimsher 7y ago
I had the opposite experience with AppleScript - the development tool (Script Editor) was simple enough for me to understand that it was the way I taught myself to program when I was 13. (OK, I learned Logo in school when I was 7, but programming became way more interesting when I discovered AppleScript's APIs to control all the programs on my Mac).
coldtea 7y ago
>As a counter-anecdote, the built in Ruby interpreter in Mac OS X Tiger was the way I learned to program and how I got interested in programming And you think a one-click download and install of Ruby would have prevented that? Not to mention Apple also has Swift, and Swift Playgrounds and so on for kids these days.
firecall 7y ago
Sure... but that was then. I too had a real hard time learning Ruby back in the day. But now if you google any Ruby or Rails how-tos they will include a one-line Brew and RBENV install. So I get what you are saying but I think we are in a new world here.

wyclif 7y ago

Right, I think most developers know that it's a bad idea to mess with the old, unmaintained system versions of Python, Ruby, or Perl. Almost everyone I know uses Homebrew to install the bleeding edge versions separately, and that will save you a world of pain. For Python folks, just install pyenv/pipenv and you can easily maintain `system` (Python), Python2.7x, Python3.7.3, &c as separate environments. For Ruby people it's rbenv.

ende 7y ago
Or anaconda!

blablabla123 7y ago

And it's to be appreciated. When installing my own Python version, I'm worried it might interfere with system tools that might be written in it.

ken 7y ago

This alone isn't evidence of that, but it's not the only data point we have. We've got 20 years of observations. They dropped X11 (and didn't use it for the main display in the first place), created new process APIs (like GCD and background tasks), deprecated standard libraries like OpenGL (and don't support Vulkan), designed their own programming language, etc. All of these point in the same direction. What will be left? Will it still be "Unix" in any meaningful sense just for having a C compiler and running an old version of Bash? Microsoft Windows did that, too.

lone_haxx0r 7y ago
> They dropped X11 You don't have to be anti-unix to do that though, any reasonable organization would have done the same. I agree with the rest though.