Jul 31
Welcome!
This is the blog and course site for Harvard Extension’s Computer Science E-168, “Building Web-Based Software with Ruby and Ruby on Rails.”
Welcome!
This is the blog and course site for Harvard Extension’s Computer Science E-168, “Building Web-Based Software with Ruby and Ruby on Rails.”
August 20th, 2007 at 3:29 pm
Do you have any recommendation as to what editor to use for the class (on the different platforms), emacs, textmate, radrails (eclipse), others?
http://www.ifakedit.com/log/2006/01/17/best-ideeditor-for-ruby-on-rails/
August 20th, 2007 at 4:01 pm
The course is officially agnostic on IDEs. Use whatever you’re comfortable with. We will generally not be able to help with IDE issues if you dig yourself into a hole.
I can talk a bit about what I use, and when:
(1) TextMate (on the Mac; for Windows, E: http://www.e-texteditor.com/).
This is what I use the most. Why? Because many demos and screencasts use it, the Pragmatic Programmers use it, the community uses it, etc. I like being to see the results of running a Ruby program with one click. Since I use Eclipse for my Java development, it also helps to partition my mind into Ruby and Java areas.
But above all, TextMate is not distracting. It drives me nuts when I find myself having to read IDE or text-editor documentation when I should really be producing code.
(2) A text editor. I spend a fair amount of time ssh’d into “foreign” systems that I can’t configure very much, so find myself using vi all the time; or Emacs if it’s available.
(3) Netbeans. I haven’t used it in a few weeks, but I was pretty impressed with the Ruby support in the latest builds on Netbeans (http://wiki.netbeans.org/wiki/view/RubyInstallation). It’s easy to use JRuby from here if you’re interested in that.
—–
I also find it useful to have Ruby docs open somewhere. On the desktop, I use fxri (which is properly set up with some of the “one-click” installers), or via the web, e.g., NoobKit: http://www.noobkit.com/
September 4th, 2007 at 3:45 am
I will not be able to make it to the very first class, of all things (have to be in Oklahoma for work).
Since it’s not obvious how to contact you via email, I may as well ask here if there is anything beyond the first assignment that I ought to focus on in particular.
Any administrative details I’ll be missing? Sections?
September 4th, 2007 at 10:43 am
Section assignments will be random, and then we will move people as needed. One section will be on Wednesday evening (same as the lecture); the other to-be-determined.
For focus, read ahead in the assigned readings from the “Pickaxe” book as specified in the syllabus (http://e168f07.7fff.com/csci-e-168-syllabus/) and get your machine set up as given in the first assignment (http://e168f07.7fff.com/assignments/assignment-1-due-by-26-sep/).
September 5th, 2007 at 6:14 pm
Hi John,
I’m looking forward to this course and very glad that you have organized this…I’m the guy who made that post for Rails help last month on the Boston Ruby group.
Chris
September 11th, 2007 at 1:17 am
I was wondering if it was required to install MySQL 5.0.27, since ver 5.0.45 is available.
Thanks,
George
September 11th, 2007 at 2:07 am
George: I will revisit the required versions before the first lecture (Sep. 19). 5.0.45 should be ok, but I won’t be able to say definitively until then.
September 12th, 2007 at 3:09 pm
I am about to purchase a new computer, which I will use for this class. I am thinking low-end Mac this go-around — Mac Mini vs. MacBook 13″ — and wondered if there will be any inherent advantage to being able to drag the thing physically into the class/sections. Not sure how we will develop RoR sites on our own hardware, and then demonstrate their operation [ or lack of! ] to you for grading…
lee
September 12th, 2007 at 3:28 pm
Lee — a laptop is always useful. It may be distracting during lecture, but in section, it can be very helpful to demonstrate an issue to the section leader on your own machine.
After you’ve written your code, you will zip it up and e-mail it to us. Then we will deploy it on our own computers.
September 12th, 2007 at 8:18 pm
regarding the 1st assignment :
mongrel_rails –version
should be:
mongrel_rails –-version
(this is on the windows instant-rails env.)
September 12th, 2007 at 9:09 pm
Thanks. I think somewhere along the way, possibly in the WordPress editor, a double-dash was replaced by a long dash. I will make it more clear by the first lecture . . .
September 13th, 2007 at 2:28 pm
The quotes in the final part of the homework were all fancified as well, earlier, but it looks like those got fixed now. I guess we’ll have to be careful with cutting-and-pasting code and commands from the site.
September 13th, 2007 at 3:12 pm
What I will try to do before the course commences is change the CSS so that I can embed command-line text in textarea tags. Then it will be very easy to cut-and-paste such material.
September 16th, 2007 at 12:03 pm
Hello John,
I installed MySql version 5.0.45. Tried the command mysql -V. The output was ‘mysql Ver 14.12 Distrib 5.0.45, for Win32 (ia32)’. Is this okay for the class.
September 16th, 2007 at 12:20 pm
Leena — 5.0.45 will almost surely be ok, but no official answer until Wed.
September 19th, 2007 at 8:22 am
Hi John,
I’m looking forward to class tonight, and I was hoping you might be able to comment on the RoR install for Linux users. For example, is Mongrel needed since most Linux distributions ship with Apache? Are there any other considerations Linux users need to be aware of?
Thanks,
Eric
September 19th, 2007 at 8:34 am
Eric,
You still want Mongrel for Linux.
It goes like this:
– When you’re developing software, you want a relatively lightweight server that you can start, stop, point at any Rails app, and not screw up your existing Apache setup. Typically for Rails app, the included server is WEBrick, which is slow. Mongrel is really fast. So we’re using Mongrel. When you start up your server for your Rails app, it will be served on port 3000 (e.g., http://localhost:3000). The beauty part is that when you install the Mongrel gem, it just takes the place of WEBrick. You don’t have to do anything. No Mongrel is a big plus.
– It is true that you have Apache on Linux, but typically you will find that for production deployment of Rails, you would have to pick and choose amongst a number of different strategies. One way to do it is to run Apache WITH Mongrel, where Apache “fronts” Mongrel. Another way is to use various Apache adapters that Rails can use: But some of them are buggy.
I will discuss the principles and ideas behind a production Rails deployment, but actually doing it depends so much on your platform and requirements, my treatment of that topic will be no means be exhaustive.
September 23rd, 2007 at 9:28 am
Not having any problems installing. Just saying hello.
September 23rd, 2007 at 11:33 am
Hi there! Will Sqlite do or must we install MySQL? -C
September 23rd, 2007 at 11:39 am
One more question: how outdated is the online version of the pickaxe book (http://www.whytheluckystiff.net/ruby/pickaxe/)? Can we use this instead of buying the latest version? thanks….
c
September 23rd, 2007 at 12:54 pm
Regarding the database: It must be MySQL.
September 23rd, 2007 at 12:58 pm
Regarding the PickAxe book (Programming Ruby): Unfortunately the first edition is quite out-of-date, and, as Dave Thomas (the author) write in his 2nd edition, there are some issues with organization and sequencing.
So… The 2nd edition is the required edition.
Here’s a review of the 2nd ed.:
http://books.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/10/13/1843240
(Some of the comments go into the out-of-datedness of the 1st ed.)
September 23rd, 2007 at 2:43 pm
The assignment description for running mongrel server says:
To do this, get a command prompt, and create a rails application named “assignment1″ with
rails assignment1
cd assignment1
Now type:
ruby script/server
[Wait - server is loading . . . When you see “** Use CTRL-C to stop” . . .]
But I get:
ruby: No such file or directory — script/server (Load Error)
When I try to run mongrel directly (mongrel_rails start) I get lots of invalid path errors …
September 23rd, 2007 at 2:59 pm
1. You definitely did both “rails assignment1″ and “cd assignment1″ before typing “ruby script/server” ?
What is happening is that the rails command creates a directory called “assignment1″ which has all of the code for your application, as well as scripts for various tasks. When you type “ruby script/server” your current directory needs to be at the top of the directory tree rails created for you.
2. Is there a file called server in the script directory?
3. What is your platform: Windows, Mac, Linux?
September 23rd, 2007 at 8:30 pm
Hey, how are people doing with OS X installs? I can manage the production of an OS X install screencast if there’s a need. Squeaky wheel gets the oil, so speak up if this would be helpful.
September 23rd, 2007 at 10:07 pm
If anyone wants a screencast for OS X, speak up!
September 24th, 2007 at 2:55 pm
Well I managed to get it up and running in OS X, though I wonder if this would be a bit more challenging for people that are not as comfortable with Unix.
This is the article that I used - it is quite good:
http://hivelogic.com/narrative/articles/ruby-rails-mongrel-mysql-osx