Roadmap for Learning Rails

I learned Ruby on Rails as my first programming language/framework. Looking back on my own reservations, hang-ups and attempts to teach other non-programmers rails, I don't think this learning approach will be successful for most non-programmers.

The first question I think is: Who wants to master Ruby/Rails and related technologies? Very few who aren't already developers - at least not at first. We're all cognitive misers. Most people want to learn the minimum to get the job done. Also, for a complete newbie, learning is usually optional. People need to be encouraged to learn a little and then keep building.

For example, when I've taught others CSS/HTML, I used to start with big overviews and then moved forward. Now, I found it's much more successful to give people the tiniest bits of information they need to do something and then building from there. People learn better when they are eager to learn.

Once they start investing some time learning or trying to build their own application, they'll do what they need to do to keep up. Figuring out how to deploy to Heroku is a minor step once you're already on the path, but as yet another whole additional thing to learn, it's intimidating to non-programmers. In my case, it wasn't until I was knee deep that I started pushing myself toward any level of mastery. When I got going, I learned Rails as I needed it when I needed it.

Ruby/Rails can be learned concurrently. While I knew CSS/HTML and basic JS, I started with the framework not understanding the difference between ruby and rails. At first, I struggled with some ruby syntax, but after I spent a day focused on Ruby basics, I stopped having that problem. I built my knowledge incrementally. This approach may not be for everyone, but I believe it is more likely to encourage continued learning.

It wasn't until after I learned Ruby/Rails, that I needed and started using GIT, picked up JS and over the past three-four years grew to be a decent all around rails developer. My best learning has come from working with other developers on larger projects. As I've learned these things, it's made picking up related technologies nearly trivial. Sinatra and mongoDB were a sneeze to pick up.

If you really want to encourage total newbies to learn Ruby on Rails or any language, you need to provide them with as many tangible benefits along the way. If they take baby steps and can see their success, they will constantly be motivated to continue and (hopefully) to improve.

I don't know how anyone can learn Rails without knowing how to program. I know designers that call themselves web "developers." But I wouldn't call someone a developer if their development involves installing thirty gems and copy and pasting snippets.

The map is overrated. Instead spend time reading chapter one of http://railstutorial.org/ and you'll have already covered many of the concepts noted {Heroku, git+github, basic Rails stuff} and just keep going at it. Hartl's (Insoshi YC approach is very much suitable for even beginners but doesn't disappoint for more advanced developers as well.

Of course, do tryruby.org first.

It's funny to read this, 'cause in many ways I started programming (flailingly) with Ruby/Rails, and then worked backwards from there. I read Peter Cooper's Ruby for Beginners book, which ended with a little Rails, and then I read some HTML. I didn't know a lick about JavaScript for a while, and so there were all these Rails helpers and shortcuts, and they were a complete mystery! Rails has so much "magic" to it that I often found myself confronted by problems that I could not understand, because I was at a level too abstracted to really know what was happening. In an odd way, though, it was really helpful – it was like walking around in a giant robot suit, being able to make greater strides than I really should have been able to on my own strength, and then having it break down from time to time and forced to understand pieces of the nitty gritty. Eventually it broke down so much that I had to do a lot of the background reading I should have done from the start; but what's nice is that I could never imagine coding a project of any sort without some sort of strict organizational system like Rails'.

I actually recommend that people spend only about an hour or two on Ruby before getting into Rails. Ruby is very intuitive and the few things that aren't can be temporarily memorized until they make sense.

My roadmap would be:

1) sinatra hello world

2) sinatra hello world w/ erb template

3) deploy it to heroku

4) do something with a form (without form helpers)

5) do something with sessions

6) do something with datamapper

7) who needs rails?

I think the easiest way to get to Rails or Django or other similar framework is to start by learning HTML, then CSS, then Javascript, then PHP + MySQL, then Rails/Django/etc.

HTML will teach you basic web markup. CSS will teach you basic design. Javascript, basic interactive functions in the browser. PHP, server-side knowledge and how to create dynamic pages. MySQL, for how databases work and how to use them in CRUD situations, or more elaborate ones.

Let's say you're not really a developer and you have 6 months to write a functioning Rails app or you're homeless. Now what's the best roadmap for learning Rails?

Good post, i've been teaching RoR at university of texas over the summer and the videos/slides are all online.

http://www.thinkbohemian.com/

Any feedback is appreciated, as this is a beta class, and i'm writing the material as I go.

When I first started with Rails the biggest problem for me was that I didn't know Ruby.

Taking the time to learn Ruby before diving into Rails will make a huge difference. And if Rails doesn't turn out to be your thing, you still have your knowledge of Ruby for Sinatra or scripting.

This roadmap looks pretty nice! I actually jumped right into Rails without knowing any Ruby, but I didn't have too many problems. That's probably because I'd been programming in other languages for years, and I had a good book. Still, some of the stops on this roadmap look interesting and I'll probably run over it myself. Nanoc and Sinatra look interesting, and I never did give Heroku a try.

By the way, has anyone else noticed that "nanoc" is "Conan" backwards?

wonder if there's a similar to-do list for learning up Django for newbies.

"It will be months or even years before you are a productive Rails programmer."

Doesn't that fly in the face of the definition of Rails?