New to Ruby? Tips for the new Rubyist.

#1

Post by kaiwren » Tue, Jun 05, 2012, 1:11 PM UTC

New to Ruby? Tips for the new Rubyist.
jasimabasheer.com

Re: New to Ruby? Tips for the new Rubyist.

#2

Post by cicloid » Tue, Jun 05, 2012, 1:43 PM UTC

Also material like Ruby Rogues podcast ( http://rubyrogues.com/ ) contain great episodes to give a newcomer a tour of the ecosystem.

Re: New to Ruby? Tips for the new Rubyist.

#3

Post by rjsamson » Tue, Jun 05, 2012, 1:58 PM UTC

Its great to see metaprogramming listed here - it is a term that tends to frighten beginners a lot more than it should. Understanding some of the basic metaprogramming concepts and features early will go a long way to helping you become a better Rubyist.

Re: New to Ruby? Tips for the new Rubyist.

#4

Post by why-el » Tue, Jun 05, 2012, 1:59 PM UTC

I would like to get some advice from experienced Ruby hackers. Currently I am picking up Ruby through rails, which I am assuming is fairly common. I want to know the downsides to this and what people did to supplement their ruby knowledge beyond Rails. I eventually would like to write my own gems, contribute to open source, and so forth. I am absolutely not satisfied with just consuming Rails.

Re: New to Ruby? Tips for the new Rubyist.

#5

Post by rjsamson » Tue, Jun 05, 2012, 2:03 PM UTC

why-el wrote: post #4

I would like to get some advice from experienced Ruby hackers. Currently I am picking up Ruby through rails, which I am assuming is fairly common. I want to know the downsides to this and what people did to supplement their ruby knowledge beyond Rails. I eventually would like to write my own gems, contribute to open source, and so forth. I am absolutely not satisfied with just consuming Rails.

The best advice I can give is get to know Ruby well - don't just focus on Rails in the beginning. Eloquent Ruby by Russ Olsen is a great read and will give you a deeper understanding if you've got the basics down. Also, the PragProg book Metaprogramming in Ruby is a great intro to metaprogramming.

Re: New to Ruby? Tips for the new Rubyist.

#6

Post by christiangenco » Tue, Jun 05, 2012, 2:08 PM UTC

> (infinite loops are almost always written using the loop do..end construct though. but how often do you write infinite loops anyway?)

`while true` usually does it for me.

Re: New to Ruby? Tips for the new Rubyist.

#7

Post by christiangenco » Tue, Jun 05, 2012, 2:10 PM UTC

why-el wrote: post #4

I would like to get some advice from experienced Ruby hackers. Currently I am picking up Ruby through rails, which I am assuming is fairly common. I want to know the downsides to this and what people did to supplement their ruby knowledge beyond Rails. I eventually would like to write my own gems, contribute to open source, and so forth. I am absolutely not satisfied with just consuming Rails.

Spend a week just learning Ruby before doing anything with Rails. There's a huge learning curve to Rails - learning the language simultaneously will just make you frustrated.

Re: New to Ruby? Tips for the new Rubyist.

#8

Post by eddieroger » Tue, Jun 05, 2012, 2:28 PM UTC

why-el wrote: post #4

I would like to get some advice from experienced Ruby hackers. Currently I am picking up Ruby through rails, which I am assuming is fairly common. I want to know the downsides to this and what people did to supplement their ruby knowledge beyond Rails. I eventually would like to write my own gems, contribute to open source, and so forth. I am absolutely not satisfied with just consuming Rails.

I came up the ranks like you, and actually abandoned Rails but stuck with Ruby for a while longer. I supplemented my Ruby skills the same way I do with most programming languages - I had an end-state in mind, and I coded towards it. In my case, this was a script and wrapper based around the MediaWiki API, but that doesn't matter. It just needs to be something doable. At that point, it's just a 10,000 hour play - code until you get it. I spend a lot of time with the docs open, but eventually that goes down, which is when you know you're getting it.

Re: New to Ruby? Tips for the new Rubyist.

#9

Post by tseabrooks » Tue, Jun 05, 2012, 2:35 PM UTC

I'm in the middle of picking up Ruby primarily because there was a GitHub project I wanted to fork and modify for my purposes that happened to be written in Ruby.The biggest problem I found is that the Ruby (or maybe the Rails?) community by and large provides shit instructions on how to get something running. I checked out a handful of projects and they all said things like, "Just deploy the normal what you deploy a rails app" and the like. Likewise, googling had almost universally bad / outdated information. Eventually I ended up with Passenger who had awesome instructions.

I finally pushed through but I suspect just getting things running is a big enough PITA to deter new people from participating in Ruby land. Even if Hannson says it's a myth.

Re: New to Ruby? Tips for the new Rubyist.

#10

Post by tferris » Tue, Jun 05, 2012, 2:37 PM UTC

rjsamson wrote: post #5

why-el wrote: post #4

I would like to get some advice from experienced Ruby hackers. Currently I am picking up Ruby through rails, which I am assuming is fairly common. I want to know the downsides to this and what people did to supplement their ruby knowledge beyond Rails. I eventually would like to write my own gems, contribute to open source, and so forth. I am absolutely not satisfied with just consuming Rails.

The best advice I can give is get to know Ruby well - don't just focus on Rails in the beginning. Eloquent Ruby by Russ Olsen is a great read and will give you a deeper understanding if you've got the basics down. Also, the PragProg book Metaprogramming in Ruby is a great intro to metaprogramming.

I can't recommend Eloquent Ruby at all: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3803016