

Ask HN: Best Ruby On Rails resources for experienced developer? - Lasher

Overwhelming number of "learn RoR" resources out there. Hoping some of the experts on HN can recommend good resources for an experienced C/C++/Java developer to learn Ruby on Rails. Paid is fine if the value is there. Thanks!
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jethrokuan
When beginning learning RoR, look through Rails for Zombies
(<http://railsforzombies.org>) and Try Ruby
(<http://tryruby.org/levels/1/challenges/0>) to get a feel of the new
language. It's quite different from C/C++/Java.

You'll get better working out and experimenting with things on your own, but
Hartl's book serves as a great beginner's guide (while being comprehensive).

I think "The Rails Way" by Obie Fernandez works as a good reference book after
you get more experienced as well.

[http://www.amazon.com/The-Rails-Way-Obie-
Fernandez/dp/032144...](http://www.amazon.com/The-Rails-Way-Obie-
Fernandez/dp/0321445619)

That's bout all(:

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regularfry
The canonical resource is the Ruby on Rails Tutorial by Michael Hartl:
<http://ruby.railstutorial.org/ruby-on-rails-tutorial-book>. It's aimed
primarily at programmers, and it's free online.

~~~
sheff
The other place to look for books is Pragmatic Programmers (
<http://pragprog.com/titles> ) who do the Agile Web Development with Rails
book which is usually fairly up to date, along with some other in depth
titles.

A subscription to Railscasts pro ( <http://railscasts.com/> ) is also well
worth the cost.

~~~
timo614
I completely agree with the Railscasts mention -- I use it and asciicasts
(<http://asciicasts.com/>) which is the text version quite often.

The pro membership pays for itself back right away as you have access to the
whole collection of pro and revised episodes he has released to this point.

The docs for ruby and rails both are really helpful too.
<http://corelib.rubyonrails.org/> <http://www.ruby-doc.org/core-1.9.3/>

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cheald
I don't have a specific resource to add, but I want to point out that Rails
has a rather steep learning curve. Once you get over the "aha!" hump, though,
it's _really_ productive.

Edit: Nevermind, here's a resource you should bookmark (even if it is
obvious): <http://guides.rubyonrails.org/>

I still reference pieces of it, and I've been using Rails for six years or so
now.

~~~
thebrokencube
> Rails has a rather steep learning curve.

I can't agree more. I came in thinking it was going to be fairly easy to pick
up, but it seems like I spend most of my time just looking up how to do things
"the Rails way" (not that that's a bad thing persay, but you definitely feel
like you're doing nothing sometimes).

Anyways, I found Agile Web Development with Rails (4th Edition):

[http://pragprog.com/book/rails4/agile-web-development-
with-r...](http://pragprog.com/book/rails4/agile-web-development-with-rails)

to be fairly useful if you don't mind buying a book. Plus, the ebook gets
updated fairly frequently with erratas and stuff, as per usual with the
PragProg team.

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brandoncordell
Railscasts.com

Railstutorial.org

The Rails 3 Way

Rails 3 Antipatterns

guides.rubyonrails.org

It's probably best to start with the absolute basics, just to make sure you
don't miss anything. Even if you just skim through them.

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sergiotapia
Good question; I'm very interested in RoR, but coming from a more static
language/framework like CakePHP and ASP.Net MVC3, I'm confused on how to use
it correctly.

Let's so someone enlightens us. :)

