Learn professional-grade web application development with Ruby on Rails

Professional-grade web development

Building a real web application

The Ruby on Rails Tutorial teaches you how to develop custom web applications with the popular Ruby on Rails web framework. Since its launch in 2010, the Ruby on Rails Tutorial has been the leading introduction to web development with Rails.

The Ruby on Rails Tutorial is designed to give you a thorough introduction to web application development, including a basic grounding in Ruby, Rails, HTML & CSS, databases, version control, testing, and deployment—sufficient to launch you on a career as a web developer or technology entrepreneur. If you already know web development, this book will quickly teach you the essentials of the Rails framework, including MVC and REST, generators, migrations, routing, and embedded Ruby.

App development principles

The basics of working with Rails

The Ruby on Rails Tutorial takes an integrated approach to web development by building three example applications of increasing sophistication, starting with a minimal hello app, a slightly more capable toy app, and a real sample app. The emphasis throughout the tutorial is on general principles, so you will have a solid foundation no matter what kinds of web applications you want to build.

Setting up your dev environment

Web development requires tools

In the first chapter, you’ll get started with Ruby on Rails by installing all the necessary software and by setting up your development environment. You’ll then create your first Rails application. The Rails Tutorial emphasizes good software development practices, so immediately after creating your fresh new Rails project you’ll put it under version control with Git. And, believe it or not, in the chapter you’ll even put your first app on the wider web by deploying it to production.

Simple toy application

It might not be pretty, but it works

In Chapter 2, you’ll make a second project, whose purpose is to demonstrate the basic workings of a Rails application. To get up and running quickly, you’ll build this toy app using an automatic code generator; because this code is both ugly and complex, Chapter 2 will focus on interacting with the toy app through its URLs using a web browser.

Putting everything together

Putting all your knowledge into action

The rest of the tutorial focuses on developing a single large real sample application, writing all the code from scratch. You’ll develop the sample app using a combination of mockups, test-driven development (TDD), and integration tests. You’ll get started in Chapter 3 by creating static pages and then add a little dynamic content. You’ll take a quick detour in Chapter 4 to learn a little about the Ruby language underlying Rails. Then, in Chapter 5 through Chapter 12, you’ll complete the foundation for the sample application by making a site layout, a user data model, and a full registration and authentication system (including account activation and password resets). Finally, in Chapter 13 and Chapter 14 you’ll add microblogging and social features to make a working example site.

The result is a thorough grounding in web application development that will serve you well as a technical manager, entrepreneur, or professional software developer.