Skip to content
Open
Show file tree
Hide file tree
Changes from all commits
Commits
File filter

Filter by extension

Filter by extension

Conversations
Failed to load comments.
Loading
Jump to
Jump to file
Failed to load files.
Loading
Diff view
Diff view
1 change: 1 addition & 0 deletions en/documentation/ruby-from-other-languages/index.md
Original file line number Diff line number Diff line change
Expand Up @@ -24,6 +24,7 @@ with.
* [To Ruby From Perl](to-ruby-from-perl/)
* [To Ruby From PHP](to-ruby-from-php/)
* [To Ruby From Python](to-ruby-from-python/)
* [To Ruby From JavaScript](to-ruby-from-javascript/)

## Important Language Features And Some Gotchas

Expand Down
Original file line number Diff line number Diff line change
@@ -0,0 +1,70 @@
---
layout: page
title: "To Ruby From JavaScript"
lang: en
---

JavaScript is a ubiquitous programming language, primarily known for web
development but also used for server-side development with Node.js. Going
from JavaScript to Ruby, you'll find Ruby has more structured syntax and
strong object-oriented principles, but you'll also discover Ruby's focus
on developer happiness and expressiveness.

### Similarities

As with JavaScript, in Ruby,...

* There's an interactive prompt (called `irb`).
* Objects are dynamically typed.
* Functions are first-class objects.
* There are no special line terminators (except the usual newline).
* You can define functions inside other functions.
* Arrays and objects (hashes in Ruby) are core data structures.
* There is excellent support for functional programming with blocks,
iterators, and higher-order functions.
* Variables are dynamically typed—you don't declare their types.
* Both support closures and can capture variables from their
surrounding scope.
* Regular expressions are built into the language.
* Both languages are interpreted, not compiled.


### Differences

Unlike JavaScript, in Ruby,...

* You don't need to worry about browser compatibility—Ruby runs
consistently across platforms.
* Everything is an object, including numbers and basic types.
`5.times { puts "Hello" }` is valid Ruby.
* There's no concept of `undefined`. Ruby uses `nil` instead of both
`null` and `undefined`.
* Functions are called methods, and you typically call them on objects.
* There's `public`, `private`, and `protected` for method visibility,
rather than relying on conventions or closures for privacy.
* Ruby has class-based inheritance with single inheritance plus mixins,
rather than JavaScript's prototype-based inheritance.
* Variables have different scopes indicated by their prefix (`@instance`,
`@@class`, `$global`) rather than using `var`, `let`, or `const`.
* String interpolation uses `#{}` syntax: `"Hello #{name}"` instead of
template literals or concatenation.
* Ruby blocks with `do...end` or `{...}` are more powerful than
JavaScript arrow functions and are used extensively for iteration.
* Minimal punctuation: semicolons are optional and rarely used.
* Blocks are delimited with `end` (or `do...end`) rather than `{}`.
* It's `elsif` instead of `else if`.
* Ruby has symbols (`:symbol`) which are immutable strings often used
as identifiers.
* No type coercion surprises—Ruby is more predictable about type
conversions.
* Ruby methods can end with `?` (for predicates) or `!` (for
destructive operations).
* Parentheses for method calls are usually optional.
* You use `require` or `require_relative` in Ruby, whereas in JavaScript you use ES6 `import` (or Node.js's `require()`).
* Classes are defined with `class...end` blocks rather than constructor
functions or class expressions.
* Ruby has built-in support for operator overloading.
* When tested for truth, only `false` and `nil` are falsy. Everything
else is truthy (including `0`, `""`, and `[]`).
* Ruby has extensive metaprogramming capabilities—you can easily
modify classes and objects at runtime.
Loading