spooq wrote:
>  On 11/20/06, David Kastrup <dak@[...].org> wrote:
>  > spooq <spoooq@[...].com> writes:
>  >
>  > > I would like to suggest the newbie learns VBA. The financial world
>  > > lives and breathes Excel. VBA is by far the language most likely to be
>  > > of use to someone entering that world. It's pretty clear programming
>  > > is a tool for his/her use, rather than something that (s)he wants to
>  > > do for it's own sake. Having said that, Excel can be viewed as a type
>  > > of DSL in it's own right, so pushing the boundaries of what can be
>  > > done 'natively' is a great place to start.
>  >
>  > Isn't VBA rather similar to Ruby, anyway?
> 
>  To me it looks like an OO BASIC with support for databases and Office apps.

My two cents here as someone who swtiched from VB script to Ruby on why
not VBA, is pretty simple.  If you learn VBA your are locked in to MS
products only this was my feeling as I've not heard much of VB anything
on a non-Windows environment or at least none to take note of.  While
it probably is the best way to go if you are in a MS only environment
and are ok with that it seems at least to be a non-transferable
language.  I did switch to Ruby however exactly because as was said
above it is very much like VBA which I had experience with.  The other
reason I switch if the OP cares is that Ruby is a younger language and
this give me an opportunity to learn the language before/if the
language becomes more popular.  So far (6 months) I like Ruby very much
and with the help of some people on this list I've managed to put into
production some of my scripts.

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