Editing Ruby (programming language) (section)

=== Early concept ===
According to Matsumoto, Ruby was conceived in 1993. In a 1999 post to the Ruby-Talk mailing list, he shared some of his early ideas about the language:<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.ruby-lang.org/en/documentation/faq/|title=Official Ruby FAQ|author=Shugo Maeda|date=17 December 2002}}</ref>

{{Blockquote|I was talking with my colleague about the possibility of an object-oriented scripting language. I knew Perl (Perl4, not Perl5), but I didn't like it really, because it had the smell of a [[toy language]] (it still has). The object-oriented language seemed very promising. I knew [[Python (programming language)|Python]] then. But I didn't like it, because I didn't think it was a true object-oriented language{{snd}} OO features appeared to be add-on to the language. As a language maniac and OO fan for 15 years, I really wanted a genuine object-oriented, easy-to-use scripting language. I looked for but couldn't find one. So I decided to make it.}}

Matsumoto described Ruby's design as resembling a simple [[Lisp (programming language)|Lisp]] language at its core, with an object system like that of Smalltalk, blocks inspired by [[higher-order function]]s, and practical utility like that of Perl.<ref name="lisp-features"/>

The name "Ruby" originated during an online chat session between Matsumoto and Keiju Ishitsuka on 24 February 1993, before any code had been written.<ref name="rubyconf-history-of-ruby"/> Two names were initially proposed: "Coral" and "Ruby". Matsumoto chose the latter in a subsequent email to Ishitsuka.<ref name="ruby-name"/> He also noted that one factor influencing the choice of the name was that a colleague's [[birthstone]] was [[Ruby_(gemstone)|ruby]].<ref name="faq-name"/><ref name="ruby-talk-name"/>