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permalink: features
title: Ruby Compendium – Advanced Language Features
type: page
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<p>One of the best things about Ruby is that you&#8217;re not stuck with a single programming paradigm. Even though everything in Ruby is an object (thereby making it a fully object-oriented language), nothing forbids you to program procedurally, or even use typical functional constructs.</p>
<p>The beauty of this is that you can (and should) combine elements from different paradigms, resulting in very powerful and expressive code. What I really like about Ruby though is its inherent dynamic nature.</p>
<p>You have a very few constraints when coding:</p>
<ul>
	<li>you can open and close class definitions at will,</li>
	<li>you are not constrained by object types</li>
	<li>you can mix-in methods in multiple classes at the same time</li>
	<li>you can write code that <em>writes itself</em> dynamically (this is commonly called <em>metaprogramming</em>)</li>
	<li>you can easily create Domain-Specific Language to solve problems faster, with style</li>
	<li>you can create and pass around blocks of code</li>
</ul>
<p>All these things make the language very flexible and powerful. Do not overuse Ruby&#8217;s power: if your code starts to look like black magic, you&#8217;re probably going too far.</p>
<aside class="box">
<div class="box-title">If you want to know more...</div>
<p>&#8230;on specific and advanced Ruby features, check out these articles:</p>
<ul>
	<li><a href="http://olabini.com/blog/2006/09/ruby-metaprogramming-techniques/">Ruby Metaprogramming techniques</a></li>
	<li><a href="http://www.skorks.com/2010/05/ruby-procs-and-lambdas-and-the-difference-between-them/">Ruby Procs And Lambdas (And The Difference Between Them)</a></li>
	<li><a href="http://juixe.com/techknow/index.php/2006/06/15/mixins-in-ruby/">Ruby Mixin Tutorial</a></li>
	<li><a href="http://www.valibuk.net/2009/03/domain-specific-languages-in-ruby/">Domain Specific Languages in Ruby</a></li>
</ul>

</aside>


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