# Learn First? **URL:** \ **Category:** Ruby\ **Created:** [September 5, 2007, 9:06am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/learn-first/113820 "2007-09-05T09:06:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![BScott](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/d26b3c/32.png) [@BScott](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/BScott)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 9:06am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/learn-first/113820/1 "2007-09-05T09:06:29Z")
Hello, all I’m new to Ruby and I purchased both Agile books for learning Ruby & Rails. I don’t know If I should learn Ruby first or dive into Rails? ---
**Author:** ![BScott](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/d26b3c/32.png) [@BScott](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/BScott)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 9:12am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/learn-first/113820/2 "2007-09-05T09:12:30Z")
BScott wrote: > Hello, all > > I’m new to Ruby and I purchased both Agile books for learning Ruby & > Rails. I don’t know If I should learn Ruby first or dive into Rails? I think you will receive very varied responses to this - some will say Ruby and others will say Rails. The way I did it was to learn a very little bit of Ruby first (enough so that the language made some sense), then went to AWDWR and learnt Rails to start getting productive. After that, I revisited Ruby to expand the power of what my applications could do. Finally, I revisited Rails to get into more advanced Rails topics. I think it’s the Agile Process - one then the other, then the one, then the other… 🙂 Hope this helps. Cheers, Mohit. 9/5/2007 | 3:10 PM. ---
**Author:** ![BScott](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/d26b3c/32.png) [@BScott](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/BScott)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 12:30pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/learn-first/113820/3 "2007-09-05T12:30:59Z")
On Sep 5, 12:02 am, BScott [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > Hello, all > > I’m new to Ruby and I purchased both Agile books for learning Ruby & > Rails. I don’t know If I should learn Ruby first or dive into Rails? Maybe do both with David’s book, Ruby for Rails. [http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1932394699/bookstorenow600-20](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1932394699/bookstorenow600-20) T. ---
**Author:** ![BScott](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/d26b3c/32.png) [@BScott](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/BScott)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 8:55pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/learn-first/113820/4 "2007-09-05T20:55:59Z")
On Wed, 05 Sep 2007 16:02:50 +0900, BScott wrote: > Hello, all > > I’m new to Ruby and I purchased both Agile books for learning Ruby & > Rails. I don’t know If I should learn Ruby first or dive into Rails? It depends. “Agile Web D. with Ruby on Rails” contains a very nice tutorial at the beginning. If you only have a few problems understanding the code there, and you know the basic concepts of classes and objects etc. from other languages, feel free to start with rails. But since Ruby and its concepts are somehow different, you should have the pickaxe-book on your desk too, to read one or another chapter, when needed. You will need this book anyway, so buy it. If you are new to programming at all or to object oriented programming, you will not really understand, what “Agile Web D. with Ruby on Rails” is about. Try to learn Ruby first. Thomas ---
**Author:** ![BScott](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/d26b3c/32.png) [@BScott](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/BScott)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 4:22pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/learn-first/113820/5 "2007-09-05T16:22:59Z")
On Wed, Sep 05, 2007 at 04:02:50PM +0900, BScott wrote: > Hello, all > > I’m new to Ruby and I purchased both Agile books for learning Ruby & > Rails. I don’t know If I should learn Ruby first or dive into Rails? If you know how to program in at least one other language, learn Ruby first. If you don’t know how to program in some other language, get Chris Pine’s excellent Learn to Program (which teaches in Ruby), then learn Ruby well (e.g. from the pickaxe book). Once you know Ruby solidly, you are ready to not just learn Rails but to use it effectively. If you start with Rails without knowing how to program in Ruby you may eventually make it to strong competence in both Ruby and Rails, but you will have produced hundreds of lines of code that will/should embarrass you on the way (and heaven forbid they actually go into production somewhere). –Greg