Disclosure: This is a paid review. Saying that, all our reviews are honest. It wouldn’t be fair otherwise.

Introduction - What is it?

The book Build Your Own Ruby on Rails Web Applications (Patrick Lenz) aims to take the beginner Ruby on Rails developer on a practical journey through the Ruby on Rails environment and will offer the reader a step-by-step real-world project along the way. Doing exactly as it says on the tin, by the end of the book you will have built your first RoR web app. Hurrah!

The book reads as a guide to creating modern websites/apps in a fun way instead of a tedious manual detailing every command available without any practical advice.

Who needs it?

Put simply, the majority of newcomers to Ruby on Rails would get a great benefit from this book. It not only provides worthwhile content for a seasoned programmer new to RoR, but guides (and focuses on) the less programmatically minded (inlcuding front-end designers) through the development environment in an interactive, hands-on way.

What Do They Say?

From sitepoint:

This book will:

• show you how to install Ruby on Rails on Windows, Mac, or Linux
• walk you, step by step, through the development of a Web 2.0 social news application, just like digg.com
• show you how to test, debug, benchmark, and deploy your Rails application

It’s a bold claim. But given sitepoint’s ultra-usable approach, let’s see if Patrick can pull it off…

The Content

For the purpose of this review, I intend to guide you through the first 4 chapters (of 12) of Build Your Own Ruby on Rails Web Applications.

Chapter 1: Introducing Ruby on Rails

The first chapter discusses the RoR environment. The reader is informed of the pros of the framework, what full-stack is and how all of this fits together to form web applications. A little daunting for some, if it weren’t for the plain English describing the Rails environment.

Of course, the Ruby language is covered and the history of RoR is explained. Handily, this chapter introduces the factors that make RoR different. (Hint: The ethos is to make life easier but still flexible for the developer.)

All of this is really is about setting the scene and motivating the developer. The developer now understands the RoR framework and can get stuck into that first web app.

Chapter 2: Getting Started

The most important chapter in this book for some. I have aimed to complete many projects in various environments but, alas, I fell at the first hurdle. I understood the programming environment to some degree, I just couldn’t actually set it up!

This chapter is a Godsend. The following packages are defined in Layman’s terms and the rationale for installing them is also included:

• the Ruby language interpreter
• the Ruby on Rails framework
• the MySQL database server

An installation walkthrough is then offered for Windows, Linux and Mac users (top marks there). Expecting page after page of install procedures? Sorry to disappoint. There’s only a few pages for each operating system.

Follwing the install procedure, a file structure guide, an application start walkthrough and advice on which text editor to choose is offered.

Thorough. Thoroughly happy.

Chapter 3: Introducing Ruby

Ruby is defined in this chapter, but not dwelled upon. I think that the key here is balance. Too much information about Ruby here could send a potential RoR developer off the rails.

OOP in a general sense is introduced and a basic understanding of its merits are given. This is probably overkill for a more seasoned programmer but I guess the beginner would welcome this. The theory of how OOP works in Ruby is explained in great detail. One could say that reading this alone could give you a good insight into Ruby.

A nice touch in this chapter is the listing of how Ruby outputs code using the interactive ruby shell. This is surely trivial to some but it might just prevent hours of head scratching.

Chapter 4: Rails Revealed

Explaining Ruby without explaining Rails would be silly.

Three Rails environments are defined (development/test/production) giving an insight into actually how to use Rails in a commercial sense. Kudos to Patrick for explaining that three databases are needed (one for each environment) and what data to use.

Luckily for new RoR developers, guidance is given on how to test the Rails environments and also how to debug them. Not that we’d need to. ;)

By now, an understanding of how the Digg-like web app you’ll be building is apparent. Over the next 8 chapters, you’ll have built a Digg of your own.

In Conclusion

I honestly have to say a big thumbs up to the author. The flow of the book is logical and appeals to not only novice RoR developers but novice developers full stop. Including detailed setup guides was a stroke of genius and will aid many a confused RoR newcomer, I’m sure.

My only concern would be the length of the book. Some may be put off. But that’s also the books forté. It provides thorough background information throughout but still keeps to the clean reader-friendly approach of sitepoint books of late.

Book Info

Build Your Own Ruby on Rails Web Applications

• Written by Patrick Lenz, published by sitepoint.
  
• Order from sitepoint.
• Features:
• Download code: No typing from the book!
• 30 day money back guarentee
• ISBN: 978-0-9758419-5-2

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