1: * What's Ruby
    2: 
    3: Ruby is the interpreted scripting language for quick and
    4: easy object-oriented programming.  It has many features to
    5: process text files and to do system management tasks (as in
    6: Perl).  It is simple, straight-forward, and extensible.
    7: 
    8: 
    9: * Features of Ruby
   10: 
   11:   + Simple Syntax
   12:   + *Normal* Object-Oriented features(ex. class, method calls)
   13:   + *Advanced* Object-Oriented features(ex. Mix-in, Singleton-method)
   14:   + Operator Overloading
   15:   + Exception Handling
   16:   + Iterators and Closures
   17:   + Garbage Collection
   18:   + Dynamic Loading of Object files(on some architecture)
   19:   + Highly Portable(works on many UNIX machines, and on DOS,
   20:     Windows, Mac, BeOS etc.)
   21: 
   22: 
   23: * How to get Ruby
   24: 
   25: The Ruby distribution files can be found in the following FTP site:
   26: 
   27:   ftp://ftp.ruby-lang.org/pub/ruby/
   28: 
   29: The trunk of the Ruby source tree can be checked out with the
   30: following command:
   31: 
   32:   $ svn co http://svn.ruby-lang.org/repos/ruby/trunk/ ruby
   33: 
   34: There are some other branches under development.  Try the following
   35: command and see the list of branches:
   36: 
   37:   $ svn ls http://svn.ruby-lang.org/repos/ruby/branches/
   38: 
   39: 
   40: * Ruby home-page
   41: 
   42: The URL of the Ruby home-page is:
   43: 
   44:    http://www.ruby-lang.org/
   45: 
   46: 
   47: * Mailing list
   48: 
   49: There is a mailing list to talk about Ruby.
   50: To subscribe this list, please send the following phrase
   51: 
   52:         subscribe YourFirstName YourFamilyName
   53: e.g.
   54:         subscribe Joseph Smith
   55: 
   56: in the mail body (not subject) to the address <ruby-talk-ctl@ruby-lang.org>.
   57: 
   58: 
   59: * How to compile and install
   60: 
   61: This is what you need to do to compile and install Ruby:
   62: 
   63:   1. If ./configure does not exist or is older than configure.in,
   64:      run autoconf to (re)generate configure.
   65: 
   66:   2. Run ./configure, which will generate config.h and Makefile.
   67: 
   68:   3. Edit defines.h if you need.  Usually this step will not be needed.
   69: 
   70:   4. Remove comment mark(#) before the module names from ext/Setup (or
   71:      add module names if not present), if you want to link modules
   72:      statically.
   73: 
   74:      If you don't want to compile non static extension modules
   75:      (probably on architectures which does not allow dynamic loading),
   76:      remove comment mark from the line "#option nodynamic" in
   77:      ext/Setup.
   78: 
   79:   5. Run make.
   80: 
   81:   6. Optionally, run 'make test' to check whether the compiled Ruby
   82:      interpreter works well.  If you see the message "test succeeded",
   83:      your ruby works as it should (hopefully).
   84: 
   85:   7. Run 'make install'
   86: 
   87:      You may have to be a super user to install ruby.
   88: 
   89: If you fail to compile ruby, please send the detailed error report with
   90: the error log and machine/OS type, to help others.
   91: 
   92: 
   93: * Copying
   94: 
   95: See the file COPYING.
   96: 
   97: 
   98: * The Author
   99: 
  100: Feel free to send comments and bug reports to the author.  Here is the 
  101: author's latest mail address:
  102: 
  103:   matz@netlab.jp
  104: 
  105: -------------------------------------------------------
  106: created at: Thu Aug  3 11:57:36 JST 1995
  107: Local variables:
  108: mode: indented-text
  109: end: