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As tbray mentioned, Sun hired "The JRuby Guys" today (rather, announced that they had).

We were discussing the announcement in #redmonk (you were there, right? If not, check it out), and most folks seemed quite happy with it.

I, of course, think it's great.

Personally, it gives me a thrill to when coders who've worked passionately on a project get a patron or otherwise "win."

Professionally, I'm on record as saying that JEE (and, really, all of Java) needs to become the multi-language platform for long-term survival:

Abstracting away the OS was the early dream, but the missing feature to all of that was limiting the platform to Java only. The dynamic language JSRs are key to realizing this broader platform play. As such, the next bet for Java EE's long-term survival is for the Java EE community to make running dynamic languages and frameworks like PHP, Rails, JavaScript, and python work as well, and even better, in Java EE as they do in Linux.

Now, while it's too soon to read in that much into the hire of two dudes -- Sun still hasn't monetized Roller despite frequent prodding from us, esp. from James -- it's certainly a welcomed milestone.

Questions, etc.

Several things to think about are:

• Once JavaScript is wrapped into the JDK, will Ruby be next? I'd hope the answer was yes.
• If that's true, what will this mean for the Java coders out there in the "normal" shops? The rock-stars are already coding in nirvana, but it's the unlucky and Bodhisattva code-monkies I'm concerned about. Will the legions of corporate coders out there figure out how to get JavaScript and Ruby into their projects? Clearly, Sun could help out here. If Effective Java had an entry on using dynamic languages, there would be no worrying. (I realize that's something of an ironic example since BLoch no longer works at Sun.)
• What kind of support can we expect to see in NetBeans (and, through competitive innovation, Eclipse)? I've long wanted to see command completion and refactorings for dynamic languages in IDEs. Thankfully, it looks like this problem is on the right short-list.
• Building on the IDE point, becoming the Ruby IDE could be a major event for NetBeans. As most of you, dear readers know, we rarely miss a chance to question the division between Eclipse and NetBeans; becoming a Ruby IDE would throw a new angle, in Sun's favor, into that discussion.

Brew-hah-ha

One thing's for sure, we can expect some exciting brew-hah-ha as JavaScript, Ruby, and other dynamic languages get closer to JEE and "corporate programming." We've seen that pattern in the past, and just as in the maturing of Agile, there's always a tedious tension to go through as a school of thought goes mainstream. The Cool Kids hate it when Wal-Mart starts selling replicas their clothes.

I, of course, think that's all distraction. If it compiles, and users like it: Ship It!

Disclaimer: Sun and Eclipse are clients.

Tags: jruby, sunw, ruby, javascript, dynamiclanguages, java