Posts tagged as: rails

Active State is supporting Ruby

Active State has released a beta of version 3.5 of their Komodo IDE that supports Ruby and Ruby on Rails. I've played with Komodo in the past, but never attempted to use it regularly. I'll be trying it out for my Ruby tests.

Lots of balls in the air

I've got so many projects ideas that I think I should list them, if only to remind me of where I want to go:

• CSS: Redesign Darwinianweb.com site to use style sheets.
• Ruby: Amazon API based app to determine the best book on a given subject.
• Ruby on Rails: Rebuild the CMS for this blog from the current FoxPro code.
• Ajax: Google API based app using Google Maps.
• Ajax: A stripped down version of TiddlyWiki as a form of self-modifying page.

Ruby on Rails is gaining traction

While searching for web hosts the last two days it has become clear that Ruby on Rails is attracting a lot of attention. Many of the web hosts who support it make a big deal of that fact on their home pages. Some hosts don't want to run Rails, because it is supposed to use up a lot of resources. I wonder if most of these people signing up to use it are moving from existing hosts who don't support Rails, or if new web developers are starting up?

New Ruby site

I got my new site started to experiment with Ruby at ruby.darwinianweb.com. I decided to go with Textdrive.com, since they are recommended by the developers of Ruby on Rails. I went through the usual hassles of setting up the DNS. Darwinianweb.com is registered at Godaddy.com and its DNS is handled by Bluehost.com where this blog is hosted. So I had three different companies pointing me back to the others for a while.

Now I'm going through the standard "Why won't any of my scripts run?" that I experience on most new hosting services. Once I get everything placed right and working I can start setting up an Amazon web services development project.

Time to start Ruby programming

I've been reading Ruby books for a week now and I'm getting antsy to do some coding. My way of learning a language is to pick a real target and then push my way through all the obstacles. That forces me to do the hard tasks, but keeps me from wasting time on features I'll never need. I know I've been saying that I want to use Ruby to run the CMS for this blog, but I want to hold off on that until I add enough features. For example, I still need to add calls to ping servers and tagging to this blog. It will be easier to just do that in FoxPro first, and not worry about the programming language at the same time. Besides, from everything I've seen, Ruby on Rails will be the best way to build a CMS with Ruby, so I'll wait until later to start that project. I'll pick an easier target for my first Ruby project.

I've had an idea for Amazon web service programming for a while that might make a good candidate. I'd like to build a "pick the best book on a subject" app. I'm not sure exactly what that means, but the general idea would be to enter a search term and have the app rank available books based on a set of criteria I develop. That will let me explore the Amazon database from the inside.

My first step will be to build a development environment. I could start by doing Ruby programming on my own computer, but that won't let you look over my shoulder easily. I could do the Ruby project on the server where this blog is hosted, but that brings up the security issue. Programming on the web in a new language always leaves open the possibility of security holes. I'd rather do my quick and dirty development in a separate location and then move them to a new server for production use. I also like the idea of a distributed environment for web development. It allows for better scaling and gives me more control later for rearranging the architecture. So my first task will be to build ruby.darwinianweb.com at a new host.

When I first started looking at Ruby I saw that there were some hosting sites that provided Ruby and Ruby on Rails installations at extremely low rates. They billed themselves as Ruby playgrounds, which is a great idea. I've been a programming language junkie for over 25 years, and the idea of playing with a new language is always a thrill. It looks like these hosts are aimed directly at that market.

Plans for using Ruby

I guess I should explain what I want to do with Ruby. A major motivation for learning it is the amount of buzz surrounding it and the application framework Ruby on Rails. Language popularity comes in waves that usually last 3-4 years. In the 10 years I've been involved with the Internet I've seen Java, Perl, Javascript, PHP, Python and now Ruby each have their turn as the hot language.

Ultimately I want to write web 2.0 style mashups, but my first Ruby app will be the content management system that runs this blog. I know it sounds crazy to build yet another CMS, but that is the type of application I know best, so it makes a good testbed for new tools.Of course, I have no plans of creating a CMS that others can use, just something with enough functionality to serve my purposes. Right now I've written a system with Visual FoxPro, because I've been an xBASE programmer for 25 years and can do it in my sleep. I want to gradually rewrite it in Ruby and then rewrite it again with Rails.

One issue will be database access. Eventually I will use MySQL as the back-end, but at first I'll want to use Ruby with the .DBF files I am already using in the FoxPro version. Since Ruby has a much weaker set of available libraries than Python, I haven't been able to find a native Ruby module for DBF access. The path I'll probably go down will be to use a Python DBF library and a library that lets me call Python code from Ruby. It sounds like a horrible kludge, but it will let me learn Ruby while doing some practical work. I'll write the database routines so that they can easily be converted to MySQL later.

Book Note: Teach Yourself Ruby in 21 Days

I started learning the Ruby programming language today. Ruby and the associated framework product, Ruby on Rails, seem to be all the rage among web 2.0 developers, so I thought I'd give it a try. It seems to be a "real" object oriented language, so I'm looking forward to it. I've programmed in Perl, which can be forced to use OO techniques, and Python, which is much more OOish, but I've mostly used them in a procedural manner. This time I'm going to try and really work with classes as well as objects. Back in the early 90s, when OOP first appeared in popular use, Borland hired me to write a book about their future dBASE for Windows product. I spent a year doing nothing but studying OO ideas and really fell in love with the approach. Sadly, the product was a bust, and the book never saw the light of day.

I have a stack of Ruby books on my desk, and I'm going to start with this one from Sams. You can find the details at Amazon if you want to read along with me.