For Immediate Release
November 28, 2001
For more information, a review copy, cover art or an interview with
the author, contact:
Kathryn Barrett (707) 827-7094 or kathrynb@oreilly.com 


CREATOR OF RUBY WRITES O'REILLY'S NEW RUBY BOOK


Sebastopol, CA--As a programmer and self-styled "programming-language
geek," Yukihiro "Matz" Matsumoto knew what made him happy while
programming, and he designed Ruby with those elements in mind.  "Ruby
was developed for the purpose of making programming both enjoyable and
fast," Matsumoto explains. "I based the language on an object-oriented
paradigm, provided a solid feature set including exceptions, iterators,
etcetera, and made sure to keep things consistent and balanced." The
result of his efforts is an absolutely pure object-oriented scripting
language that combines the strengths and capabilities of all the
popular scripting languages, and is recognized for its elegance and
power.

While its roots are in Japan, Ruby is gradually gaining ground in the
US, where programmers have eagerly awaited an English version of
Matsumoto's original guide to the language. First published in Japanese
as an O'Reilly pocket reference, "Ruby in a Nutshell," by Matsumoto (US
$24.95) has been expanded and packed full of discussions, examples, and
code to take its place among O'Reilly's acclaimed Nutshell books. "Any
programmer who uses Ruby will want to have this book on his or her
desktop," says Matsumoto. "Although Ruby is not a complex language, it
comes with a sizable class library. No one can memorize all the methods
in the library, therefore, this book is the best companion when you
program in Ruby."

According to Matsumoto, Ruby has gained its reputation as an especially
elegant language because it was designed from the beginning to support
object-oriented programming.  For example, everything in Ruby is an
object; there's no exception.  "I've developed what I call the
'principle of least surprise,'" Matsumoto explains. "All the features
in Ruby are designed to work exactly as ordinary programmers expect
them to work."

With "Ruby in a Nutshell," Matsumoto offers a practical reference to
the features of this new language including the command-line options,
syntax, built-in variables, functions, and many commonly used classes
and modules.  The book is based on Ruby version 1.6.5, but its contents
will remain applicable to future versions of Ruby as well. Chapter 6,
"Ruby Updates" covers the changes to be included in the next stable
release, Version 1.8.

Ruby finds its power through its built-in libraries, and this helpful
guide will lead programmers through the many useful libraries that come
with the standard Ruby distribution--from network access via HTTP and
CGI programming, to data persistence using the DBM library. The book
concludes with coverage of the unique tools that come with Ruby,
including the debugger, profiler, and irb (or Interactive Ruby.)
Programmers will find "Ruby in a Nutshell" to be a concise and thorough
reference that they will want to keep close at hand while working with
Ruby.

"An Introduction to Ruby," by Colin Steele, is available on the
O'Reilly Network at:
http://linux.oreillynet.com/pub/a/linux/2001/10/25/ruby.html

An excerpt from Chapter 4, "Standard Library Reference," is available
free online at:  http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/ruby/chapter/ch04.html

For more information about the book, including Table of Contents, index, 
author bio, and samples, see:
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/ruby/ 

For a cover graphic in jpeg format, go to:
ftp://ftp.ora.com/pub/graphics/book_covers/hi-res/0596002149.jpg 

Ruby in a Nutshell
By Yukihiro Matsumoto
With translated text by David L. Reynolds, Jr.
ISBN 0-596-00214-9, 204 pages, $24.95 (US)
order@oreilly.com
1-800-998-9938
http://www.oreilly.com

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