I wouldn't really know, as the few gigs I've worked have all already had ERB templates. I also tend to care very little about "market share" or the next hot thing; if I have the choice and one tool is easier/faster for a certain task than another (and yes, HAML is better for producing HTML or XHTML markup than anything else right now), I'll use the better tool. However, HAML is **braindead simple** to learn and become proficient with (really, http://haml-lang.com/tutorial.html doesn't exaggerate at all about its simplicity), and since when was learning more technologies ever a bad thing?
pharrington wrote: I also tend to care very little about "market
share" or the next hot thing; if I have the choice and one tool is easier/faster for a certain task than another (and yes, HAML is better for producing HTML or XHTML markup than anything else right now), I'll use the better tool. However, HAML is **braindead simple** to learn and become proficient with (really, http://haml-lang.com/tutorial.html doesn't exaggerate at all about its simplicity), and since when was learning more technologies ever a bad thing?
learning more technologies is only a bad thing when it turns out to be a waste of time. A broad category of development such as dynamic web app development doesn't just move forward, it tends to move back and forth quite a bit. Many people think they have a better idea, but many of them are wrong. One could waste a lot of time if one learned/tried-to-use every new fad that came out.
I'm hoping to find out from this thread if HAML is side-to-side, or forward motion. Sounds like your vote is "forward".
thanks, jp
Neither Haml nor Sass have "moved side to side." There has been consistent forward progress, the churn is non-breaking, so working code is seldom (if ever) affected by changes. Time-to-bug-fix is extremely fast if you can produce a reproducible bug, and the developers remain completely engaged in the project.
If you want a better flavor for what's going on with Haml and Sass, check the Haml group:
http://groups.google.com/group/haml
You may also be interested in Compass, a Sass framework that takes advantage of Sass features to put an abstraction layer on top of CSS.
http://groups.google.com/group/compass-users
My approach to this whole kind of decision making is to try the technology and if it suits my needs, then fine. Use it. I try not to invest my learning time in dead technologies, so it's probably right of you to ask what people think about Haml's current state in the development community. It is currently supported by (or currently supports):
Rails Sinatra Merb Webby StaticMatic Compass
And probably a bunch of other Ruby tools I haven't named. Do a "hello world" app with it and see whether you find the style useful for your needs.
Hope this helps and do check out the Google groups.
Jeff Pritchard wrote: [...]
Thanks Steve, this is useful and interesting info.
If you'd like another data point, I completely agree with Steve. Haml is wonderful, and Sass is to ny knowledge the *only* tool that makes it feasible to make CSS truly semantic and free of presentation classes. I can't imagine doing without them again.
Just to clarify, my "side to side" analogy was intended to convey that some new tools did nothing to improve the Rails toolset -- some new tools moved app development sideways rather than forward. There have been plenty of "best thing since sliced bread" new ways to do things with Rails that have turned out to be just a distraction and which, in my view, were not an improvement over the "old way", and which have since faded away (apparently others agreed).
There's always some of that in any evolving technology.
Sadly, some of those "bright ideas" were adopted by the Rails team, so we're stuck with those (like REST).
REST is a big step forward, so this is probably an inapt example...
Thanks for the info on HAML and Compass jp
Best,
Marnen Laibow-Koser wrote:
Jeff Pritchard wrote: [...]
Thanks Steve, this is useful and interesting info.
If you'd like another data point, I completely agree with Steve. Haml is wonderful, and Sass is to ny knowledge the *only* tool that makes it feasible to make CSS truly semantic and free of presentation classes. I can't imagine doing without them again.
Just to clarify, my "side to side" analogy was intended to convey that some new tools did nothing to improve the Rails toolset -- some new tools moved app development sideways rather than forward. There have been plenty of "best thing since sliced bread" new ways to do things with Rails that have turned out to be just a distraction and which, in my view, were not an improvement over the "old way", and which have since faded away (apparently others agreed).
There's always some of that in any evolving technology.
Sadly, some of those "bright ideas" were adopted by the Rails team, so we're stuck with those (like REST).
REST is a big step forward, so this is probably an inapt example...
Thanks for the info on HAML and Compass jp
Best, -- Marnen Laibow-Koser http://www.marnen.org marnen@marnen.org
Thanks Marnen. I've been studying HAML and SASS and Compass over the weekend, and I think I'm convinced. I'm going to do my next project with them and see how it goes.
Sadly, some of those "bright ideas" were adopted by the Rails team, so we're stuck with those (like REST).
REST is a big step forward, so this is probably an inapt example...
THE EMPEROR HAS NO CLOTHES! 
(I know there are plenty of otherwise intelligent people who like it,
but in my opinion, REST is dumb if you're not writing a web service - I
see no advantage at all for a normal web application - and my feeble old
brain refuses to be able to remember the darn path names - much easier
to just use a hash of controller/action - and none of my clients is ever
willing to allow a UI organization that is just straight-forward CRUD,
always need custom actions, and the 'standard' crud just winds up as
dead code )
When I came across HAML & SASS, there was no doubt in my mind that this is certainly much better and lesser time consuming that normal erb files.
After having worked on the two for a good 2 months I again hold my belief, but recently I have been facing quite a lot of issues when I tried deploying my application to my web hosting, which was giving the error for any of rake operations saying
!rake aborted invalid file – haml [almost like this]
Thanks & Regards, Dhruva Sagar.
Samuel Goldwyn - “I’m willing to admit that I may not always be right, but I am never wrong.”
