Update (12/21/06): I was in a pretty upset state of mind after struggling with a barely-working comment system for many days when I wrote this posting. I didn't want to take my frustrations out on Typo because I liked Typo (plus, I really didn't think this was Typo's fault because Typo worked fine under light load), so I picked on Rails instead. Please read this posting as a silly angry rant rather than a well thought-out criticism.
It wouldn't be fair to judge the venerable Ruby on Rails "platform" based on a single data point (*cough* it sucks! *cough* *cough*), but after days of agony trying to get comment submission to work properly in Typo (executing an INSERT after an HTTP POST must be a requirement that's outside of Rails' "scope"), I decided to go back to my roots and run this blog on Wordpress.
(Yes, I was tempted to write my own blogging engine in Erlang, but I decided against it -- I must keep my eyes on the prize :) )
Based on my admittedly limited Rails experience, even if Erlang isn't your cup of tea, I recommend avoiding Rails and sticking to PHP or Python (or Smalltalk, about which I hear nice things) unless you're an optimization genius who loves the thrill of Linux tinkering; you're hopelessly stricken by a successful marketing blitz; you're a masochist; you wrote a Rails book; or you're just not planning on success.
I can't comprehend why some people think it's justifiable to ask someone how many worker processes he would like to run. I wouldn't want to pick a low number like, say, 5, because that might indicate that I have self esteem issues, but then I'm trapped by the fear than an astronomically high number such as, gosh, 20, would hose my VPS.
Sometimes, when I let my imagination run wild, I wish I could say something crazy, like "500,000".
Oh wait -- I can :)
Update (11/2): Wow! Wordpress is so much faster than Typo! Good job, Matt! :)
16 comments:
If you haven't already found it, here is a WordPress version of the Scribbish Typo theme you were using:
http://pittcrew.net/geekblog/scribbishwp
Just in case you wanted to stick with the same "look & feel" as before.
Great blog BTW!
i also prefer WP. but my god man, pick a better theme! ;)
I will, I will :)
Here we go, back to Scribbish. Thanks for the link, Darin. Although maybe I'll change it eventually now that I have so many more great themes at my fingertips :)
LoL! I guess Erlang doesn't rob you of your sense of humor eh? :-)
On the blog, Congratulations! I think it is needed. I just don't know what to think of rails sometimes. It is like that quirky lover who you KNOW you have to breakup with eventually, but whose sadistic behaviour you find alluring because they get all this attention from everybody else and so that keeps you from doing it one more day. And you say to yourself, tomorrow, I'll definitely do it tomorrow ... :)
I hear ya on the pain and suffering of rails deployment.. I've been there, but you know gems and rake and capistrano do take some of that pain away. The only problem is that you have to be a wizard.
Best of luck on your ErlyWeb adventure. As an outsider to Erlang and ErlyWeb (very interested and trying it right now) I would say please do two things if these are the only things you are going to do:
1. make an easy to install package so it is almost a oneclick install and document the process and maybe explain the little things that maybe very obvious to experienced ppl but baffling for newbies.
2. Create a quick screencast (with sound if possible)
I think this framework has potential, and I think ERlang maybe the natural language for a web framework (but that is just ignorant me)
thanks for sharing your creative work with the rest of the world! and good luck!
cheers,
-Amr
Ouch! That's a little harsh on typo, and I can say that as someone who has been a little frustrated with it from time to time. Nonetheless, you should, as a matter of principle, write something with Erlang as a proof of concept. It would be interesting to see how it comes out. I'm doing the same thing in Haskell. (And you'll soon find that PHP is pretty unpleasant stuff to dive into...)
Amr -- did you see the erlyweb-0.1.zip file I created? You can simply unzip it in your Erlang library path and it should work.
Paul -- I think Typo is a nice blogging tool, and I have no problem with Typo itself, but it's built on pretty shoddy foundations. At least I'm happy I enountered its weaknesses in my blog rather than after I've invested real money and time building a Rails app.
> Sometimes, when I let my imagination run wild, I wish I
> could say something crazy, like “500,000″.
> Oh wait — I can :)
:)))
This site even "feels" faster than with typo. Good choice.
Ann OOTB collection of apps (blog,wiki,forum) type thing would be helpful in kickstarting the uptake process IMO.
Thanks for the tip. I'll look into making something cool... It'll have to be simple and have a nice Erlang flavor :)
I've seen some hardcore Railers migrating from Typo to Memphisto...anyway, WordPress is a reasonable choice as well. Even Signal vs Noise still uses WordPress if my memory works well. As for Smalltalk/Seaside, what usable blog system does it provide?
BTW, in your project descriptions on the right, there's an interesting typo:
"Recless: A Typo Inferring Parse Transform for Erlang"
Hehe isn't THAT ironic. Thanks for letting me know. I don't know of any SmallTalk blog software, but it may exist -- I haven't looked. I just heard Seaside is a very nice framework.
Hey Yariv, Nice to see you switched to wordpress. I am regular reader of your blog. But it's not great to directly attack Ruby on Rails. I know that currently Typo sucks! But this does not mean Ruby on Rails is bad! I don't know but how do you recommend "I recommend avoiding Rails". I am finding your explanation about avoid rails as a foolish explanation! :(
Hi Anil, I wrote this posting when I was in a pretty upset state of mind, after Typo has been giving me trouble for many days. I was hoping my readers would realize it was just a rant rather than some well thought-out criticism.
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