What is Ruby and why should you learn it?

Introduction

Ruby is an open source programming language that was created by Yukihiro Matsumoto in the 1990s. A global community of developers and users have since contributed to its development, with more than 100,000 Ruby applications available online. Today, Ruby is used by companies such as Twitter and GitHub as well as by thousands of startups across the globe. It’s also popular among developers who want to create custom software packages using open source tools like OpenStack or MongoDB on their Raspberry Pi devices—or just stay up-to-date on new technologies!

Who uses Ruby?

Ruby is used by companies like Amazon, eBay, Twitter, and Basecamp to build their platforms. Developers at large organizations like Google and Facebook use Ruby to build internal tools. Open source projects like Rails and Sinatra are written in Ruby. And there are plenty of startups that use the language as well—Spotify for example uses it for most of its backend codebase!

What is Ruby used for?

Ruby is used for a variety of web development tasks, including:

• Creating websites and web applications
• Creating web services
• Command line tools (e.g., to automate processes on your computer)
• Desktop applications (e.g., to organize your files or run a program at the command line)
• Mobile apps (e.g., to write an iOS app in Objective-C or an Android app in Java)

What is meant by “open source”?

Open source software is any program whose source code is available for anyone to see, modify and redistribute. This differs from proprietary software, where the creator of a program holds the rights to it and does not allow others to view or modify its inner workings. Open source projects are often free for all users, but this isn’t always the case – some open source programs charge a fee for use.

One of the biggest advantages of open-source software is that its code can be audited by anyone who wants to check it out. This helps prevent bugs from slipping through unnoticed (and then causing problems down the line), since they can be identified before they cause issues in someone else’s machine. It also allows programmers who aren’t familiar with certain languages or frameworks to learn more about how they work so that they can improve them further down the line when needed (or even just use them as-is).

How does Ruby compare with other programming languages?

Ruby is a general-purpose programming language. This means that it can be used to build applications in any domain. It also means that the Ruby language itself doesn’t force you into one way of thinking or working.

• Dynamic language: Dynamic languages are flexible and allow you to change your program while it’s running, without having to restart everything each time. You can add new code or even remove existing methods on the fly to make changes as needed. For example, if you want to rename a method while your application is running, this will not cause any problems or crashes!
• Interpreted language: A program written in an interpreted language does not need its source code compiled before it can run. Therefore it can interpret the source code itself on the fly! This makes for faster development cycles since we don’t have to wait for compilation every time we make changes; programs written this way will run almost instantly after saving them (as long as they don’t contain syntax errors).

How can I learn Ruby?

Ruby is a general-purpose, object-oriented programming language that can be used to build web applications. Ruby was created in the mid-1990s by Yukihiro Matsumoto (Matz), who based it on his own custom scripting language.

It has a clean syntax and is easy to read and write. It has many features like classes (similar to those found in Python) or blocks, which make it easier for you to write code that reads well. Ruby also has a built-in testing framework called RSpec, so you can test your code as you’re writing it too!

The syntax of Ruby is very similar to Python; if you already know one then learning another will not be difficult at all! Because of its clean syntax, many people find it easier than Java or C++ because there are fewer rules about how things must be done. This means there aren’t any surprises when we go back through our source code later on down the line either. Hence we know exactly what we wrote because everything makes sense from start until finish :)

Anyone can take advantage of open source resources to add the Ruby programming language to their skill set.

In this blog post, I’ll show you how to get started with Ruby on the Command Line, and then we’ll look at some of the resources available for learning more.

The Ruby language is open source and has been around since 1995. It’s supported by a large community that’s constantly working to make it better. There are plenty of resources available online to help you learn Ruby, either as part of your job or just for fun. If you’re interested in building applications with code that works quickly and efficiently—whether they’re web services or desktop programs—Ruby is a great choice because it’s easy to learn, fun to use and relatively easy to implement with other languages such as JavaScript (which powers web applications) or Python (which can be used for data analysis).

Conclusion

Ruby is a great language to learn. It’s easy to use, has a large community of users, and can be used for many different types of projects. If you want to learn more about Ruby or other programming languages, check out our other articles on the subject!