Learning Ruby on Rails 2.0?

February 3, 2009 11:02 PM

Foreword: No ruby background aside from basic tutorials. Here's the deal. I've tired the Agile Web Dev (2nd edition) book for rails, very out of date. I need to learn something. I want to learn ruby on Rails. I've gone through the Rails guide on creating a rails blog (http://guides.rubyonrails.org/getting_started_with_rails.html). So, rather then buy it now (3rd edition of book as beta) or just wait, I want to get on the fast track to learn rails 2.2 (soon to be release 2.3) . Basically I'm looking for a online resource super cheap or free that provides quality information relating to rails and ruby. Help and suggestions welcome
posted by BoldStepDesign to Computers & Internet (6 answers total)

Here are a few:

http://www.railscasts.com

Ruby on Rails 2.1 - What’s new

Railsbrain - enhanced ROR documentation

And the new version of the guides is so pretty...

I also recommend the Rails forum.
posted by andreinla at 11:15 PM on February 3, 2009

Obie's The Rails Way covers Rails 2.0, but a lot has changed since then. It will still be a huge help, though.

Seconding Railscasts. They're great.

Wow, I haven't checked out the Rails Guides yet, but they look great, too.
posted by cdmwebs at 12:22 AM on February 4, 2009

Railscasts are a good way to go. Same with some of the peepcast videos. Really, the best way to learn is to do. Just pick a project and starting working on it. Google when you get stuck. Also, download projects off github. There are lots of complete Ruby projects you can look at to learn from.
posted by chunking express at 8:05 AM on February 4, 2009

Sitepoint's Simply Rails 2 is a good one to start with. It's tuned for beginners, so you should be able to pick up RoR easily. PeepCode has excellent screencasts, though some are quite outdated, and they're not free.
posted by curagea at 1:30 PM on February 4, 2009

You not just install the version of Rails covered in Agile Web Development, learn it, then learn what changed in Rails 2 from the various online guides specific to that? It's not like Rails isn't about to majorly change again anyway.
posted by PueExMachina at 6:59 PM on February 4, 2009

This is definitely one of the challenges, frustrations, and joys of Rails development. All of us, including the folks who write the docs and guides, are busy trying to keep up with the core development. It's worth it, though. The development experience (which was great three years ago) has continued to improve with all these changes.

Once you get your feet under you I recommend developing against Edge Rails where possible just to force yourself to keep abreast (but freeze Rails and any plugins one way or another when you deploy). And definitely follow your favorite bunch of Rails bloggers so that you hear about new features as they emerge.
posted by Songdog at 7:34 PM on February 8, 2009