On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 3:27 PM, James N. [email protected]
wrote:
No, I will try another program to learn to write a program. Ruby is just to hard
to download, and to work with.
thanks for all your help and understanding.
James N.
To put it bluntly: All easy(-ish) to use and learn scripting languages
follow the same path: download, install, use editor to write software.
Java, .NET, and C/++ are much more difficult for a newby to software
development to get running (assuming that you mostly use a computer to
get stuff done, and don’t have much of a technical background).
With Ruby installed, all you need is a text editor to write your code
in, or an IDE (which presents its own learning curve, but can pay off
in the long run).
Anyway, how, in your opinion, can we make it easier for you to get
started? IOW, what do you expect to have, when you download a Ruby
installer?
–
Phillip G.
Though the folk I have met,
(Ah, how soon!) they forget
When I’ve moved on to some other place,
There may be one or two,
When I’ve played and passed through,
Who’ll remember my song or my face.
On 2011-04-12, at 07:29, Phillip G. wrote:
On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 3:27 PM, James N. [email protected] wrote:
No, I will try another program to learn to write a program. Ruby is just to
hard to download, and to work with.
thanks for all your help and understanding.
James N.
Anyway, how, in your opinion, can we make it easier for you to get
started? IOW, what do you expect to have, when you download a Ruby
installer?
I’m sorry we weren’t able to give you what you needed, James. I do wish
you luck in learning about programming.
This does bring up an issue. I would like to see www.ruby-lang.org have
a page `Totally new to programming’, with appropriate resources; this
page would be prominently linked to on the front page.
It would have a paragraph or so on what Ruby is, along with what the
installers do, along with a few resources that would help a total
beginner get started. I can visualize many interactions like this.
A: You’re a programmer, can you tell me how I can learn programming?
B: Try Ruby, it’s a great way of getting started.
A: What do I do?
B: Well, go to www.ruby-lang.org, and they have all the information
you need.
Unfortunately, that isn’t really good enough for somebody who has no
framework to see what all the various pieces are. So one page that says
`here’s what Ruby is, here’s what an installer is, here’s how you get
Ruby running on your computer, and here’s what you should read to get
started with Ruby’ would be a tremendous resource for beginners. I’m not
claiming that the information isn’t out there, just that it isn’t in a
form that a true beginner can use.
When I used to do software engineering training for a company I used to
work for, one of the more popular courses I ran was called `Programming
for Non-Programmers’, aimed at giving people exactly that framework. A
lot of beginners get stuck there, and can’t easily move forward without
a bit of help.
– vincent
On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 7:59 PM, Phillip G.
[email protected] wrote:
Anyway, how, in your opinion, can we make it easier for you to get
started? IOW, what do you expect to have, when you download a Ruby
installer?
He does raise a good point - it would be nice to have a classic 3 pane
IDE (files, program text, output window) that bundled a copy of ruby
in an all-in-one installer, so that you just launched it, typed in
some code, ran it, and saved it when you were happy with it. It
needn’t be very powerful in the grand scheme of things, just trivial
to install and run “hello world” from.
martin
No, I will try another program to learn to write a program. Ruby is just
to hard to download, and to work with. thanks for all your help and
understanding.
James N.
— On Mon, 4/11/11, James N. [email protected] wrote:
From: James N. [email protected]
Subject: Re: Hello
To: “ruby-talk ML” [email protected]
Date: Monday, April 11, 2011, 10:18 PM
I will just give up on Ruby and Ruby on Rails for now
James N.
— On Mon, 4/11/11, Vincent M. [email protected] wrote:
From: Vincent M. [email protected]
Subject: Re: Hello
To: “ruby-talk ML” [email protected]
Date: Monday, April 11, 2011, 5:55 PM
On 2011-04-11, at 16:50, jake kaiden wrote:
Ruby Basic Tutorial
and, of course - there is my personal favorite, the “poignant-guide”:
http://www.thinkingaloud.net/whys-poignant-guide-to-ruby/
These are all excellent books, and for those who really want to grok
Ruby, the Poignant Guide is excellent. But for somebody who is brand new
to Ruby, and to programming in general, I’d still recommend Ullman’s
Ruby: Visual Quickstart Guide as a really good place to start. It does
things like walking you through installing Ruby, for example.
– vincent
Are you working with Windows?
() ascii ribbon campaign - against html e-mail
/\ www.asciiribbon.org - against proprietary attachments
On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 6:11 PM, Martin DeMello
[email protected] wrote:
He does raise a good point - it would be nice to have a classic 3 pane
IDE (files, program text, output window) that bundled a copy of ruby
in an all-in-one installer, so that you just launched it, typed in
some code, ran it, and saved it when you were happy with it. It
needn’t be very powerful in the grand scheme of things, just trivial
to install and run “hello world” from.
So, a package like NetBeans 6.9, then, which includes an IDE (I don’t
think that a total newby to programming should have to deal with a
full fledged IDE, though, considering the mental overhead that
introduces), and a JRuby runtime, all in one installer.
–
Phillip G.
Though the folk I have met,
(Ah, how soon!) they forget
When I’ve moved on to some other place,
There may be one or two,
When I’ve played and passed through,
Who’ll remember my song or my face.
On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 8:27 AM, James N.
[email protected]wrote:
No, I will try another program to learn to write a program. Ruby is just to
hard to download, and to work with. thanks for all your help and
understanding.
James N.
Before you give up, checkout
http://tryruby.org
It let’s you try out ruby in your web browser (firefox works the best
right
now).
iPad support, safari, chrome, opera support is coming soon :-).
Respectfully,
Andrew McElroy
http://tryruby.org
does ruby need the visual studio 2008 to run?
James N.
— On Tue, 4/12/11, Sebastian B. [email protected]
wrote:
From: Sebastian B. [email protected]
Subject: Re: Hello
To: “ruby-talk ML” [email protected]
Date: Tuesday, April 12, 2011, 10:14 AM
Are you working with Windows?
() ascii ribbon campaign - against html e-mail
/\ www.asciiribbon.org - against proprietary attachments
On Tue, Apr 12, 2011 at 9:45 PM, Phillip G.
[email protected] wrote:
think that a total newby to programming should have to deal with a
full fledged IDE, though, considering the mental overhead that
introduces), and a JRuby runtime, all in one installer.
Yep, though NetBeans is way overkill for the task. Something small and
ruby-focused would be ideal (though since the OP asked for rails as
well, maybe NetBeans or Eclipse with a few ruby and rails plugins
really would be the better way to go). Here’s the sort of feature list
I have in mind:
- A metainstaller that installs ruby (I’m thinking RVM on linux and
the one-click installer on windows) and the IDE
- The IDE will be preconfigured with the ruby and gem paths that the
installer installs into
- A GUI for the common gem commands (install/uninstall/list
installed/search remote)
- A “run” button, with output pane.
- A file pane listing the contents of the current working directory
(so that the user can see what ‘require_relative’ can access)
- A plugin architecture that allows frameworks like rails to supply
plugins that
6a. generate a project skeleton
6b. augment the “run” button as needed (in rails’s case, for example,
starting up the webserver and/or reloading all the code)
The common view of an IDE is as something that helps people with
language features, but I think an even bigger win for a newcomer is
something that helps setup and maintain an environment within which he
can write code.
martin
On 2011-04-12, at 18:27, James N. wrote:
does ruby need the visual studio 2008 to run?
James N.
No.
– vincent
Hi all,
I’m working with James N. to get him up and running.
As an investment in future knowledge, I just installed FreeRIDE on
Windows 7
x64, and whilst the text editor opened just fine it wouldn’t actually
run a
ruby program. The editor window hung with a “not responding” error.
best
James
On Wed, Apr 13, 2011 at 10:27:06AM +0900, James N. wrote:
does ruby need the visual studio 2008 to run?
Not even slightly. The only thing you need to install that is not
already on your MS Windows computer when you get it out of the box
should
be the Ruby distribution itself. You can edit code in Notepad if you
want to (but stay away from MS Word for editing code of any kind).
And RadRails is worth a look too, if you’re specifically interested in
rails development.
http://www.aptana.com/products/radrails
martin
My tactic when introducing new folks to ruby is to not shy away from the
notepad+cmd approach. I might recommend a better text editor, sure, but
ultimately I think there’s a lot of value to being comfortable with your
tools and OS.
FreeRIDE hasn’t been worked on in years, and can be considered
obsolete. NetBeans is on the heavy side, but is probably your best bet
right now.
martin
maybe that is why I am having such a hard time with it. but the other
Ruby P.s to see if they are up and running.
James N.
— On Wed, 4/13/11, Martin DeMello [email protected] wrote:
From: Martin DeMello [email protected]
Subject: Re: Hello
To: “ruby-talk ML” [email protected]
Cc: “James” [email protected], “Vincent M.” [email protected]
Date: Wednesday, April 13, 2011, 2:06 PM
FreeRIDE hasn’t been worked on in years, and can be considered
obsolete. NetBeans is on the heavy side, but is probably your best bet
right now.
martin
How about redcar, it sounds an awful lot like what some people are
describing, it may be a little on the new side thou, or something like
eric in python
Ronnie
On 2011-04-14, at 07:52, James N. wrote:
maybe that is why I am having such a hard time with it. but the other Ruby
Programs to see if they are up and running.
James N.
Several of us have been advising you to stay away from FreeRIDE. Here’s
a suggestion for you, James.
-
Go to tryruby.org and play with the Ruby system there. Try out some
simple Ruby statements and see how they work there.
-
Open a Command Prompt window on your own computer, and type
irb
If this works, you should see the same kind of output you got at
tryruby.org. You can try the same examples there as you did at
tryruby.org. If Windows complains that it doesn’t know about irb, then
you may have Ruby installed wrong. Read the directions for installing
Ruby carefully, and reinstall it.
- Once you have that working, open Notepad, and type a small Ruby
program in. Save it in a file named something.rb (the part before the .
can be anything you like, but it must end with .rb). Because of a
limitation in Notepad, when you save the file the first time, you must
put the name in double quotes: “something.rb”. Now, in your Command
Prompt window type `ruby something.rb’. If your program doesn’t have any
mistakes in it, it should run correctly.
Hope that helps – vincent
On Fri, Apr 15, 2011 at 11:47 PM, Ronnie Collinson
[email protected] wrote:
How about redcar, it sounds an awful lot like what some people are
describing, it may be a little on the new side thou, or something like
eric in python
Ronnie
ERIC supports Ruby now.