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So, the holidays are over and we’re all back at work.

Fun, isn’t it?

My nose is back to the grindstone today again, which isn’t so bad, actually. Over the holidays, Agile Web Development with Rails, 2nd Ed. came in from Amazon, so I’ve spent the day so far reading through the book.

You know how sometimes you find a real gem of a book? I am amazed by how great this book is - things are laid out clearly, Dave Thomas has a great style and strategy for getting across what a Rails developer needs to know. Within a few hours of reading, I already had a few pages of notes written down concerning things I could have been doing better with my Rails coding.

I am not approaching this book as a complete beginner, of course. I have done quite a bit of work in Rails before. I had already worked through David Black’s , which is also an excellent book. The two books together complement eachother in style and approach.

So, in short, if you are a Rails programmer and you haven’t already purchased it, go out and get your hands on this book - it will definately give you a much better understanding of Rails. The new edition has been heavily updated for the coming release of Rails 1.2, so it will be a good reference for future releases of Rails!

BTW, if someone wants to get me Rails Recipes… *wink*

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Well, I commend you! A quick disclaimer - Ruby on Rails is not for everyone, nor suited for every job. That said, spend a couple hours evaluating it, to see if it is right for you, or your project.

Good starting points:

1. Visit the Ruby on Rails website, and watch the Screencasts and Presentations
2. Download Ruby. Now Ruby on Rails can be had in a couple of different flavours depending on your platform
   1. If you are on Windows, I have tried RadRails, RIDE-ME, and Eclipse with the Ruby Development Tools, and never felt comfortable with any of them. Your best bet may be to program things using a text editor such as UltraEdit along with the windows command line to run scripts from, or to use JEdit in place of UltraEdit. Ruby usually comes with an editor called SciTE which many people like. I couldn’t get into it too well. But give it a try - you may like it. I haven’t found a Windows development environment for Ruby yet which really did the trick. There is a thread about it posted here.
   2. If you are on Linux, I would suggest jEdit with the command line to run scripts. Of course, if you develop with linux, you may be comfortable enough with vi or emacs. I wouldn’t stop you from going that way… Most of the suggestions listed for Windows are available on Linux as well.
   3. If you are on a Mac, go with TextMate. ’nuff said For more info, read the thread mentioned in the windows point above.
3. Follow through the O’Reilly Rolling with Ruby on Rails tutorial. That should give you an idea of why Ruby and Rails are great together. Don’t forget Part 2.
4. While you are reading, also check out StartAtTheBeginning and the Tutorial in the RubyOnRails Wiki. And while you are at it, read whatever other wiki pages you see that interest you. There is alot to learn there, and you will find yourself referring to it alot.
5. Like what you see so far? You should get some books. Might I recommend Agile Web Development with Rails: A Pragmatic Guide or Ruby for Rails: Ruby Techniques for Rails Developers .
6. Bookmark the Rails API. You’ll need it. Don’t be scared, though. It’s alot smaller than the Java 1.5 API.
7. Join the Rails Forum. There are alot of genuinely talented people there who would be more than willing to help you with any issues you may have. Really - a great bunch!
8. Register or subscribe to the feed for this blog. I myself am still learning about Ruby with Rails. I will post as much helpful information as I can, to help other newcomers to the language to avoid the same pits and traps I fell into.

Ruby on Rails is a young language, only a year or two old, and as such, there are alot less resources available for it than there might be for Java, or C/C++ or C# or any of the Microsoft Languages. But it is very rewarding, almost a new paradigm for those willing to take it up.

Good Luck! Feel free to post in the comments here or in the Rails Forum if you need any help.

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Scott from Scott’s Misguided Brilliance blogged about the book ‘Getting Real’ by 37signals. Now for those that don’t know, 37signals is the company which launched Basecamp. Basecamp is the product which Ruby on Rails was originally created for. Not only that, 37signals has released a succession of other major software products, and now boasts a userbase of over 400,000 users.

That’s pretty impressive for a company of only 7 programmers.

‘Getting Real’ is a tour of there company philosophy, and strategy. A seeming tour-de-force of their design philosophy and business strategy. It looks like an interesting read - I think I should get a copy.

Anyways, it grabbed my attention, so I thought I should post about it…

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