"Ruby don't take your code to town"

When the home microcomputer boom took off I learnt BASIC programming on a Sinclair ZX81 and then moved on to BBC BASIC in 1982-3. Since then I've never managed to program on a PC. I kept the day-job, but those hobbyist coding days (and nights) were really enjoyable.

Several computer programs were produced that sold in nurse education:

• Nursing Process
• Computer Assisted Nursing Assessment
• Blood Groups
• Shades of Grey (nuclear weapons simulation)

In the 90's I looked at C++ and Smalltalk, but nothing happened. The first pit-a-pat of tiny feet in 1985 was the key factor. Now in 2007 the h2cm website needs revising. I'm undecided on how to tackle this; a content management system is a possibility? While doing some reading/browsing though, I've discovered a computer language with an enticing shine.

I've decided to try to learn Ruby. Whether this will lead anywhere remains to be seen, but it's fun and challenging just to enthuse a little. There's a tutorial that is encouraging, intriguing and additional tools that support Web 2.0 and Ajax look well worth the effort. Now with Ruby installed, I've run the ubiquitous "hello.rb" program using the Eclipse development environment - that's a start.

Maybe in future posts we can compare programming and nursing? That said, there doesn't appear to be any direct connections in this book. That's one birthday present sorted!