Ruby on Rails and getting started

rubyonrails-talk
1

Hi,

I want to start using Ruby on Rails on my Windows machine. I am a beginner with Ruby and Rails. Do however build websites in HTML5 and CSS3. Where can I learn how to use this Framework ? What is the best platform to work on with this as a developer, I mean what options do I have on my Windows machine ?

Any help and direction would be appreciated…

2

Start by working right through the tutorial at railstutorial.org (which is free to use online). You can work through this in the cloud so you don't need to worry about installing anything on your machine.

When you have done that then my recommendation is to not even try developing Rails on Windows, either run a Linux (eg Ubuntu) virtual machine inside windows or even better dual boot the machine with Ubuntu and Windows. I gather some have had success with Windows but the vast majority use Linux or Mac and you will find it much more difficult to get help on Win. Install ruby and rails using rvm or rbenv.

Colin

3

Hi,

I want to start using Ruby on Rails on my Windows machine. I am a beginner with Ruby and Rails. Do however build websites in HTML5 and CSS3. Where can I learn how to use this Framework ? What is the best platform to work on with this as a developer, I mean what options do I have on my Windows machine ?

Any help and direction would be appreciated...

I've never tried this combination before, but I have heard over and over in the nearly 10 years I have been subscribed to this list that Windows is really difficult to use for Rails development. Any *nix is a hundred times easier.

If you start off with the Hartl tutorial (http://railstutorial.org) you will end up using an online IDE in a browser, so you won't have to worry about any of the local setup, and you can use Windows directly. But the pro advice I have heard here time and again is to install a virtualization scheme, like VirtualBox, and run Ubuntu there as your dev environment -- or simply dual-boot into Ubuntu or another Linux.

I am not saying it is impossible to develop directly in Windows, one of my co-workers does quite successfully. But getting it to work at all was weeks of pain and struggle, and when it goes badly, there is nearly nobody to help him figure out what is wrong, since his dev environment is so custom.

Walter

4

Well said colin. For ROR Linux environment is good.

Regards, Mvsr

5

Pierre Hollander <pierrehollander@gmail.com> writes:

Hi,

Welcome, Pierre,

I want to start using Ruby on Rails on my Windows machine.

The advice I give my students who only have a Windows machine to learn with is:

a) use a cloud-based development environment, such as cloud9    (https://c9.io), nitrous (https://nitrous.io), koding.com    (https://koding.com).

b) install VirtualBox and Vagrant with a Linux-based virtual    environment.

Of these, (a) is the quickest way to get up to the point of starting to learn Rails itself.

Time and time again, people trying to use windows as a rails development environment come up with issues and road blocks. I appreciate that most people cannot plunk down $1-2000 for a mac to develop on when they already have a machine. But as things in the Ruby and Rails world progress, and this is also true in working with Node and JavaScript on the server, developers who use Windows, will maintain libraries and frameworks that work across both Windows and Unix-based platforms become fewer and fewer.

So do yourself a solid and get a Linux-based platform available for yourself, through one of the options above.

I am a beginner with Ruby and Rails. Do however build websites in HTML5 and CSS3. Where can I learn how to use this Framework ?

Colin's already provided the best source for beginners to learning Rails, railstutorial.com. (I'm pretty sure he's got that paragraph on a hot-key.) Hartl's recommendation is for Cloud9 as well.

What is the best platform to work on with this as a developer, I mean what options do I have on my Windows machine ?

The two options above seem like it.

The oft-mentioned RailsInstaller for Windows might be useful at the beginning stages, but still has serious limitations as one progresses.

6

Hi Pierre,

There are many online Ruby on Rails tutorials and courses that you will find with a Google search. I found the courses from Pragmatic Studio to be quite good, and recommend them. Starting with learning Ruby first is a good idea.

Best,

Brent