Newbie book recommendations for Rails 2.0.

rubyonrails-talk
1

So Agile rails development (covering rails 2.0) is out In October, in the mean time what book should a newbie (with some asp/asp.net development) buy?

Please don't recommend any Pdfs as I have zero use for anything that isn't in dead tree format.

Thanks in advance,

2

Hey,

Have you checked out http://pragprog.com/titles/rails3/agile-web-development-with-rails-third-edition?

You get a dead tree and a PDF for 54 bucks US. Not a bad deal, however, you get the dead tree version once it’s all done.

Haven’t seen any Rails 2.0 books out there, but like you, I’m looking as well.

Hope this helps!

  • Justin
3

Yes I saw that but was hoping there was something else out there. Oh well.

4

Hi,

You might want to check out a new book by Patrick Lenz "Simply Rails 2.0". It is getting released on May 15th.

Thanks.

5

The rails way is really good.

Its also available as a pdf

6

Colin Stevens wrote:

The rails way is really good.

Personally, I'd always recommend newbies to steer well clear of this book. It assumes a certain understanding already, but more importantly, feels like it was rushed out without proof reading. There are such a lot of typos, especially in the code samples, that it can often be very vexing trying to work through.

7

I would second the motion for "The Rails Way". I'm a newb as well and it did nothing but help me. With this book and the internet as a resource I was able to make quick progress in my learning curve.

8

I agree. The amount of errors in the code was ridiculous. I ended up returning that book, but I picked up a PyQt book instead. As for Rails, you can always pick up that Agile Web Development 2nd Edition, and make sure that you have an older Rails package installed with 2.0. When you create a new project, you can specify which Rails version to use within the filename.

That book I mentioned is going to be updated with a scheduled release date in October, BTW.

Have you tried following along with some of those $9 screencasts they got on that pink and black website? You might find that method of learning to be more beneficial.

9

Hi,

I would recommend not to focus to much on rails 2.0 in the beginning, because once you get the general picture and structure of rails, it is easy to step up to rails 2.0. I found myself using an older book and while getting all examples to work under rails 2.0 I probably learned more this way, than getting everything presented without thinking about it.

"Agile Web Development with Rails, 2nd Edition" is a very complete book to start with. If you are more on the tutorial side of life, I would recommend "railsspace", where they develop a small sized community webpage. Also it is not in dead tree form, you should make sure to see some "railscasts"!

Falk