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Hey, I've been trying to learn ruby for a little bit now, but from my previous experience with programming I learn best by getting my hands dirty. The only problem with that is the trivial typical "Hello world"/factorial/reverse a string programs are pretty generic and don't really provide insight into the language being used, so I tend to loose interest quickly.
So, I guess my question is has anyone had ideas bouncing around in their head that would make for small to medium-ish sized projects they'd like to see get worked on? I peronally have a few ideas I think would make for good rails web apps, but they're far too larg for me to take head on ATM.
Try to make a blog with some basic features, it would be a good start
Agreed. A simple blog would be a great way to learn Rails. Also, SitePoint has a great Ruby on Rails book just out that I'm going through right now. It's got a bit of conceptual stuff, but mostly it's a hands-on book project where you create a simple clone of digg.com. It takes you through installing Ruby on different platforms, understanding the file/directory structure, fundamentals of the language, designing your app (tables/relationships), where to start, how to build on your foundations, how to test, implementing AJAX, etc., etc. I'd highly recommend it for the new Rails developer! And as is the SitePoint way, you will learn to code to standards and when you're done you'll have a working, standards compliant, accessible Rails app.
Hey, thanks. I like the mini-blog-engine suggestion
The one problem with books is that they cost money :/
You can get this cheaper on Amazon. Normally I like to buy direct from SitePoint just to support their business, but I'm a little hard for cash right now too, so I saved some money shopping Amazon this time. No shame in trying to find a bargain.
You're right, it's significantly cheaper on Amazon; but it also doesn't look like the same version of the book. Do you know if there's a difference?
The book you'd get from Amazon is exactly the same as the one from SitePoint. This is a first edition book just released a few weeks ago. As with all first editions, I've found a few errors, but the corrections are all right here. And since this is such a new book, it's pretty good with conventions and practical applications that have been tested. Rails is a fairly new technology and as with all new technologies, developers argue a bit about best practices and stuff, but SitePoint is always on the forefront of standardisation, accessibility, and best practices while remaining competetive with finding new ways to do things. Wow, I should get paid for advertising!
As for the Pragmatic Programmers' Guide book, the first edition appears to be online for free...
Also, the Pragmatic Programmers' Guide seems to be more of a Ruby language book than a Ruby on Rails book. There's quite a difference between just Ruby, and Rails! If you want MVC style web applications with Ajax functionality, the Prototype Javascript library, built in functionality for testing, and databases, you want Rails. It's a complete web platform built with Ruby. If you want to build your own platform (you'd be crazy!), forget Rails and get learning all the intricacies of Ruby!
P.S. - One thing about Ruby that confused me was symbols, and I don't remember the SitePoint book being all that helpful with explaining them. In case anyone else has the same trouble, here is a wonderful explanation.
Yeah, the Pragmatic book is more about general ruby than rails development, which is where one of my quandaries is. I'm not sure weather or not it's better to learn ruby first, then rails or to try and learn them at the same time. The problem with the former is obviously that it would take longer and more practice overall, but it seems like I would come out with a clearer view of what's actually going on. Also, the next version of OS X will come with a Ruby-Cocoa/Obj-C bridge which would make it possible to write desktop apps in ruby.
That said I still want to learn rails and maybe there's some advantage to learning ruby/rails together that I'm not seeing. I've only really tried to get going with vanilla ruby so far, and that hasn't really been working
About symbols, they have been confusing me but just last night I found this link (13 Ways of Looking at a Ruby Symbol) which helped a lot. But any more help is definitely excellent
Are you proficient in any other languages (scripting or programming)? If so, I'd scrap learning Ruby, then Rails, as Rails will introduce you to enough Ruby that you'll feel alright with it by itself. The peculiarities of Ruby will undoubtedly confound you now and again, but they probably would even if you were a more seasoned Ruby developer. Let's face it, we all run into weird things on occasion and need help. Once again, if you'll only be developing Rails apps and you understand programming languages in general, you're probably okay learning Ruby along side Rails. If, however, you want to make Ruby apps independent of Rails, you'd best start studying the language by itself.
Also, another thing that was odd for me at first was they way Ruby allows you to omit parenthesis in many function calls. Very strange to me.
Getting started I went with (http://www.pragmaticprogrammer.com/titles/rails/index.html) the pragmatic book on rails. It's a good book and they talk you through basically making a little online store depot. I love the book and referenced it for a long time until it became second nature. If you are doing any web development then I would start with just learning Rails. Most of what you learn there will at least somewhat translate into Ruby, and if not you can always load up the rails gem and just write your script the same way you would in rails =P.
As for a small-mid project, I did a help desk software, which helped me learn permissions, logins, and some ajax along with all the basics. But a blog software is the more traditional starting point as everyone recommended.
If you have any prior programming experience, then Rails and Ruby will take some getting used to. Writing end at the end of an if statement, or dropping parentheses are second nature to me now, but when I was first starting I about lost it.
One peice of advice when you are developing software is to actually think long and hard about what you are naming tables in the database because Rails will actually help you a lot and read a lot cleaner if you use very practical names. In one of my first projects I called searches on users 'lookingforpeople' and it hindered learning a little bit because setting up my associations didn't read as cleanly as if I'd have named my table something practical like searches.
Almost everyone learns Ruby by learning Rails, it's a good exposure to the power of metaprogramming and idiomatic programming.
Hackety Hack sounds like it would be a pretty good fit for what you're looking for. It's very much about hands on coding, and the examples are very engaging.
Unfortunately, the hacketyhack only works under Windows... I tried to run it with 'wine' under Linux, but almost everything breaks. I've been playing around with Ruby, but I'm curious about this whytheluckystiff's product, so I guess I'll make a special day tomorrow and try to boot Winbooze!
Yeah, I wish that it was cross platform. That's obviously part of his plan for the project.
I'm new to ruby and rails too, and programming in general come to that.
I'm just working my way through the sitepoint book, which seems pretty good so far (about quarter of the way through). Of course I'm immensely confused still at this stage, but I'm hoping the fog will begin to clear a little toward the end of the book. 
I'm getting the rough idea of it all, my problem lies in memorising all the new terms being introduced, but I'll get there eventually!
Hackety Hack looks like fun, I'll definitely check that out! Also have the pragmatic programmers guide Programming Ruby (in print, I find it hard to learn from the screen) along with the 'Agile Web Development with Rails' book from the same series. Lots and lots of lovely reading to look forward to.
I just started usin HacketyHack,it`s fairly good too,everynow and again i get errors while following a tutorial.
http://hacketyhack.net/ seems like a great way to learn ruby.
Looks like a linux version is ready. Using the term 'ready' loosely. http://hacketyhack.net/get/
