On 19/11/2006, at 12:40 PM, n/a wrote:

>  'd love some comments that might help me consider my options and  
>  pick a
>  path (c++, java or ruby) w/ a higher level of confidence..... i  
>  know that
>  people here will be biased towards Ruby, but that is fine: i want  
>  to hear
>  about it....

I have been thinking, and talking, about this quite a bit lately.  
Here is my take...

Learn Ruby and C. With Ruby you can write programs fast, with C you  
can write fast programs, ie write your system in Ruby and then  
rewrite the slow bits in C (rubyinline?).

C++'s days are numbered unless you are doing seriously performance  
critical stuff (visualisation, some games, etc). Java is an  
improvement but then Ruby is at another level.