Techniques Behind Modern Web
12 Jan
Myles Eftos has given 6 things try Rails this year. They are:
- Install Rails: This is aimed at those of you out there that haven’t tried Ruby on Rails yet. Jump in - have a go, there are plenty of resources out there, and it is fairly easy to install regardless of your platform
- Upgrade to Rails 2.0: I have covered what’s new in Rails 2.0 in a number of my previous posts, and upgrading isn’t really THAT difficult if you follow the steps and fix any deprecation notices.
- Write a plugin: Plugins allow you to re-use common patterns without having to resort to the dreaded cut-and-paste keys. Rails has a built in plugin generator that gives you the skeleton code, all you need to do is to mix-in the right modules - oh, and write the code…
- Try out RESTful routes: RESTful Rails have been around for a while now, but many of the tutorials around the net are still CRUD based, so if you are a Rails beginner, you might not have tried them out yet.
- Use Ruby as your scripting language: Because Rails does such an excellent job of doing the hard work, it is very likely that you have never had to manually connect to a database or read the contents of a directory or performed other mundane tasks in Ruby. If you have to do any scripting, instead of PERL or Python, use Ruby - it will help you better understand the nuances of the language.
- Refactor your code the Ruby way: If you have come from other C-like languages (such as PHP or Java) you would
be used to the idioms from that style of coding. Try refactoring your code to use blocks instead of for loops, or using inline if statements - you can squeeze a lot into one line in Ruby, see how far you can push it. Again, this is a great exercise to learn the language.
If you are new to Rails, there would be hundreds of reasons you should try it right now. It’s the framework for modern web, it’s cool, it’s about agility etc. I have another post on what are great in Rails 2.0 and a lot of users give thumb up to it too.
This blog is currently using great service from CrazyEgg which is built on Rails to keep track user’s clicks for layout optimization. I love the Rails way!
Recommended Reading: This site recommends Website Magazine for 'Net Success
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