David Heinemeier Hansson (DHH)

When you make a class in Python, the initializer method, the starting method, is def, okay, fair enough, that's actually the same as Ruby, D-E-F, definition of a method.

Then it is underscore, not one, underscore, two, init, underscore, underscore, parentheses start, self,

comma, and then the first argument.

I look at that and go, I'm sorry, I'm out.

I can't do it.

It's just, it's everything about it offends my sensibilities to the core.

Here you have the most important method that all new objects or classes have to implement.

And it is one of the most aesthetically offensive ways of typing initialize that I've ever seen anywhere.

And you guys are okay with this?

That, to me, by the way, was the magic of Ruby.

It opened my eyes to how beautiful programs could be.

I didn't know.

I'd been working in ASP.

I'd been working in PHP.

I didn't even have the concept that aesthetics, beautiful code, was something we could optimize for, that's something we could pursue.

And even more than that, that we could pursue it above other objectives.

That Ruby is as beautiful as it is is not an accident, and it's not easy.

Ruby itself is implemented in C. It's very difficult to parse Ruby code because Ruby is written for humans, and humans are messy creatures.

They like things in just the right way.

I can't fully explain why the underscore, underscore, init, underscore, underscore make me...