I think you guys are turning this into something that it is not.
It *was* a joke .. perhaps since everywhere else on the net you see people saying how much better Ruby is than Python, Python is than Ruby ... my anonymous block can kick your lambda's ass, etc. Really -- who cares?
It *wasn't* a serious jab at a language, or its fitness as a tool w.r.t another language ... just a joke mixed w/ an observation/ comment about the choice of implementation.
I've never actually used PyMate, so I'm not sure I see its utility, but Domenico's point sort of rings true in that .. if you run PyMate, you're most likely hacking on some Python (duh, ok) .. if there's something small you want to tweak and you dive into the code, you're in for a world of hurt. Ruby does look a lot like Python, Python looks a lot like Ruby, but you use different idioms to program in every language, including these two, so looks are only skin deep.
And about the benefits of learning Ruby ... I don't disagree with them at all, really. However, you can certainly reach over your shoulder to scratch your ass, but you really wouldn't want to, would you? You'll no doubt benefit from the extra flexibility you'll gain by doing this exercise and you'll be a stronger person from it ... however if someone were to suggest you to do that, I'd imagine most of us wouldn't take it to hear, even though it makes good sense. When it really itches, you just want to take care of it ... you know what I mean?
Fritz Anderson:
You apparently believe that having gotten an improved version for free, you are entitled to ask the volunteer to dump his work and restart to your specification — but still for free.
Well .. I might be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure Domenico wrote the original PyMate, so I think he would appreciate someone taking the time to do something for others ... so I wouldn't feel slighted if I were you (or whoever wrote it) ...
Perhaps since a solution already existed, some discussion on what could be done to improve or rework what was there might not have been the worst idea to start off with.
Fred:
More seriously, if you like to hack pymate, why don't you rewrite it before someone else had to do it? Or are you proposing to do it now?
See above :-)
P.S: Why are you posting all those answers to mails no sent to the list?
Huh?
Anyway .. I think we all appreciate it when people put work into TextMate that we all benefit from. Thanks for that.
-steve