Head First Rails: A learner's companion to Ruby on Rails

This book follows the standard (excellent) Head First format that we have come to know and love. Unfortunately, virtually no command form the book works correctly in practice due to several new versions of rails being released since this book.Most are rather simple modifications such as instead of "ruby script/server" as stated in the book, the actual command is now "rails server".Some of the html code is out of date as well. The book frequently uses tags where Rails has been updated to use <div> tags instead. This isn't to bad since you should have a strong understanding of html prior to attempting Rails, but its enough to through you off and cause a second glance.All in all, I would have a hard time giving this book a solid recommendation as is. If a second version is ever released, it will probably be the go to book to learn Rails.

This is a decent book that actually whisks you through a number of concepts to get to real apps. The problem is...I just bought this book in July, 2011, and its outdated. I wouldn't have as much of an issue if the publisher has kept the forum updated or the code, but I am spending half of my time trying to figure out the correct code for Rails 3. It's good in as much that I am rooting around different forums learning other aspects, but still a pain.The book doesn't give you detailed explanation of every piece of code which is a little tough, but I seem to be picking some of it up. But the publisher really should take advantage of their web site and provide an update.

Not bad, but the style of the Head First series is to lead you through a sequential series of exercises rather than explain to you what's going on with the language. God help you if you fail at one step in the programming exercises, because everything in a chapter is sequentially dependent. Also the syntax is not updated for Rails 3.0 and that's going to confuse a lot of people. Finally, very minimal installation instructions, which can be a particular challenge for Mac users, who have to go chasing around for the latest advice on how to install Ruby on Rails on Snow Leopard. Again, not a bad introduction, but certainly not a reference, and at least the edition I bought was not up to date.

It seems like I'll echo much of what's been written - this book is in dire need of an update. Let me share just one example. one of the very first examples in the book instructs the user to launch the bundled rails web server by issuing the following command:> ruby script/serveras of Rails v 3, it works this way:> rails sA majority of the book is outdated in a similar fashion. It's a shame because the book is so well written, and laden with wonderfully practical examples. I hope the author will update the book.

I am deeply disappointed. I should have read the more recent reviews. This book is about an earlier version of Rails and Ruby. Even the most basic commands, such as how to start the web server, are totally different (">ruby script/server" in the book, ">rails server" in the current version). If there is a way to find the versions of Ruby and Rails about which this book was written, I haven't found it, mainly because--as far as I can tell--there is no mention in the book about what version of Ruby and Rails it was written to support.I also haven't found a cross-reference on the web that tells me what a given command's analog is between the old and new versions. It took an hour of utilizing the most well-known search engine on the web to just figure out the current command for starting the web server--I don't have time to do that for every single command supported by Ruby OR Rails!Apparently the site the book directs you to for the software downloads only has (or directs you to--it isn't all in lone location) the latest versions. It also wouldn't have hurt to put four or five pages of instructions outlining how to actually install Ruby and Rails onto a given platform, I'm baffled how they say their rationale for this is that "this is not a how-to book" (direct quote) when that is EXACTLY WHAT IT IS!!! "HOW TO" use Rails! Ruby and Rails (and Ruby Gems) all use different methods to install onto a given machine. I'm still a bit perplexed about Ruby Gems. I'm not sure exactly what they are--I have a couple of hunches, but the book certainly doesn't explain it.As soon as Rails 3.1 became available (October 2010), this book should have become unavailable. Either that or Head First Publishing should have maintained a site from which one could download everything covered in the book. I mean, it is all OPEN SOURCE! The website for the book makes no mention that the book (or the site) is about the earlier versions of the software.Buy this book if you want to dive "Head First" into Rails for Ruby...into an empty pool!!!

I've been reading about Ruby on Rails online , how cutting-edge is and how easy to create and maintain a dynamic website using ROR , so i decided to learn the language.To my disappointment my first steps were a disaster since all the easy-to-find and for free documentation online required a certain background (models, objects, php, java, sql) which i had none! And therefore i could make no sense out of it.With this book, following each chapter page by page i managed to understand the structure and logic behind model, view, controler and more.It certainly is a big help for someone who's starting from zero.The book doesnt cover everything but like i wrote above gives you a clear idea of what Ruby on Rails is, so u can go further studying online resources without being discouraged.Value for money!Book covers Ruby on rails 2.x .Since Rails is on version 3, i found few differences in the code and expressions but reading and comparing with updated documentation online i found my way trhough it.If you feel this might be a problem then you should wait for an updated version of this book covering Rails 3.xIt wasnt a big problem for me!

The book takes you through building an application in Ruby on Rails, and most of the attention is on Rails. Unlike some other guides and online How-tos, there's also a lot of explanation of *why* you're doing each step.There's not much about Ruby itself though, so you'll need to have done some programming in other languages to take on this book. The author seems to assume you'll be able to get to grips with the syntax of the language yourself, which works fine, as Rails generates most of the code anyway.I'm still working through it, but it's working for me!

good reference guide.

Dies ist der beste Weg sich in eine neue Programmiersprache einzuarbeiten. Für Ruby on Rails würde ich mir eine Aktualisierung wünschen