

The Ruby on Rails 3 Tutorial book (with PDF downloads) is out - mhartl
http://railstutorial.org/?discount=hackernews01

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mhartl
As a special thank-you to the awesome community here, the main story link
above contains a Hacker News–specific code for a 20% discount on _Ruby on
Rails Tutorial_ PDF purchases, good for 30 days. Here is the code if you want
to use it directly:

    
    
        hackernews01
    

As noted on the Rails Tutorial site, the online version of the book is still
free, and purchasers of the PDF will get unlimited free updates through the
final release of Rails 3.0. (The online version will also be updated, of
course.)

Finally, I'd like to announce that, after the Rails 3 ecosystem and book text
have fully stabilized, the HTML source of the online version will be available
under a Creative Commons license to allow for translation into other
languages. Hacker News readers interested in translating the _Ruby on Rails
Tutorial_ book should email me at my personal address (available in my HN
profile).

~~~
mechanical_fish
I hate to look a gift horse in the mouth, but e-junkie is vomiting on the
code.

EDIT: No, wait, the discount happens _and_ e-junkie reports that the code is
invalid. ;) So I guess it's just a scary false alarm. Might want to fix it
though; it nearly scared me away, so count me as an "A" in the informal A/B
test of "scary popup/no scary popup".

~~~
mhartl
Thanks! That was a snafu. There was no Hacker News code proper, because I
accidentally _named_ the discount hackernews01, and then forgot to fill in the
code field with the actual code. Happily, despite the scary warning,
E-Junkie's default behavior when this happens is to automatically apply any
discounts with a missing code field—which in this case was the very discount
whose code didn't work!

It's fixed now, and the discount code should work without any frightening
JavaScript popups.

By the way, this is why I always monitor the Hacker News comments obsessively
whenever I launch something. You guys rock!

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thinkbohemian
On a side note, i'm teaching a ruby on rails class based on Agile Web
Development with Rails (rail3 beta version) and all of my lecture videos, and
slides along with course erata are online <http://thinkbohemian.com>

the more rails3 the better. maybe my next class should be based on this book
instead, let me know what you think.

~~~
mhartl
That course looks great! I wish such classes were available when I was in
school.

By the way, you might want to be careful about using _Agile Web Development
with Rails_ when teaching a course. Its code license is quite restrictive, as
you can see at <http://books.pragprog.com/titles/rails4/source_code>:

    
    
        Copyrights apply to this source code. You may use the source code in
        your own projects, however the source code may not be used to create
        training material, courses, books, articles, and the like. We make
        no guarantees that this source code is fit for any purpose. 
    

I generally think the PragProgs are awesome (I originally learned Rails from
_AWDwR_ and a Pragmatic Studio course), and it seems bizarre that they really
might not want you to use their book in your course, but that seems like a
reasonable interpretation of their license. ( _Caveat_ : IANAL.) On the other
hand, all the source code in the _Ruby on Rails Tutorial_ book is released
under the MIT License (<http://railstutorial.org/book#license>), so you can do
pretty much anything you want with it. (Technically, the _Rails Tutorial_
source code is dual-licensed under the MIT License and the Beerware
License—the latter of which invites you to buy me a beer if you're ever so
inclined: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beerware>. :-)

~~~
thinkbohemian
Thanks for putting this together, you're definitely qualified, and i like what
i've read. In case I end up jumping ship, do you prefer light or dark beer?
(Also would you consider discounts for students with .edu email ?)

I've been very careful to not use any of the book's code in any of my
presentations. I only use the book as exercises for the students, and to
server as a content template for what order to teach materials.

They donated free pdf books to all .edu students in the class, so i don't
think they would sue me...hopefully...

~~~
mhartl
I'd be happy to offer a .edu discount. Email my personal address and we can
discuss it further.

I like all kinds of beer, but let's go with dark for now. ;-)

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sachinag
Just bought it. I have a feeling this will be a better value than my $1500
Thoughtbot class. :)

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rauljara
Awesome. I'm very glad that there's a free online version, as well. Oddly,
that makes me much more likely to purchase the pdf.

Now, if only Rails 3 were finished.

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marcamillion
Hey mhartl...love that this is finally done.

One suggestion I have though, is I feel like you are giving away too much on
the site.

One point of interest is that I can just simply press 'view all as single
page' and then do a Print to PDF and have everything in one nice PDF.

Granted, I am sure the official version looks MUCH nicer, but there isn't THAT
much difference between the crude version and your version - in terms of
content.

So one suggestion might be disabling that function. Allow users to be able to
see all the chapters and everything, and even if they want to print it all
out, they could still do it chapter by chapter, but that is a huge hassle.

Also, if you did that, I would love to know what impact it had on sales (if
any) :)

Hope that helps.

~~~
mhartl
Thanks for the feedback, and I appreciate your concern. I'll consider removing
the link you mention, but I'm not too worried about the scenario you describe.
The PDF resulting from "Save as PDF" is total crap; for instance, there is no
source code syntax highlighting, and none of the cross-reference links
work—it's not even remotely as nice as the PDF available for purchase. Plus,
most people don't even notice the "view as single page" link you mention. ;-)
Finally, I personally love that link, and I want other people to have the
convenience of a single-page view, too. Among other things, it makes searching
the book a breeze, rendering an index unnecessary, even if you don't buy the
PDF.

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shelly
Wow, awesome! Especially cool that you're releasing under CC to allow for
translation - thanks :)

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BvS
Looks great!

One question/suggestion I have is if you are planning to have some kind of
forum on your site so people who are working with the book could help each
other. Might be especially interesting for people who only have "general
computer knowledge" (like me).

I know there are millions of other pages to look for help but have something
dedicated especially to this book might still be useful. If you or other
experienced programmers would answer some of the questions you could also
charge for that (I would pay).

~~~
mhartl
I've been considering a forum for a while, and I've looked as several possible
alternatives. One problem is that a forum could easily be a no-win situation
for me: if I participated regularly, then it would become a huge time sink; if
I didn't, then people would likely complain that I wasn't answering their
questions.

I like your suggestion of having experienced programmers charge to answer
questions, but I don't know of any successful pay-for-answers forum model.
That doesn't rule it out, though, and maybe it's worth running an experiment
at some point.

It's worth noting that there is a feedback form, available here:
<http://railstutorial.org/feedback>. It's not as interactive as a forum, but
it serves some of the same purposes.

~~~
samratjp
Thanks for the updated edition! As about comments, I personally think the
DjangoBook website has gotten it right somewhat - it has a comment facility
wherever one would want to <http://www.djangobook.com/en/2.0/chapter01/>

