[lisp_padawan]

as a PHP and ruby programmer (these are my two primary languages) I have to say I agree completely with your comments, you express perfectly a nagging thought that's been, well, nagging for quite some time now. I am very interested to know which you think are better languages that a young programmer might learn next that avoids these pitfalls whilst still retaining the 'practicality' of PHP & ruby for 'getting things done'

many thanks in advance

[bhiggins]

seriously, almost anything else.

try python or perl.

[donw]

As somebody who did lots of Perl for many years, spare yourself the pain, and do Python.

That said, Ruby is still my 'favorite' language -- it's just so much fun to code. But the libraries, and frankly horrible interpreter, have caused me to chuck it out the window for my company. The speed actually isn't the big problem -- it's the long-term maintainability and flexibility.