Prince:Starting with Ruby

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A suggested path for learning ruby:

1. Go to tryruby.org to do a very basic interactive tutorial (just to get a basic feel for ruby)
2. For first-time programmers, look at Learn to Program in Ruby
3. Go through Learn Ruby the Hard Way (free html ebook)
4. Look over the ruby-lang.org documentation page. This is an important reference for the Ruby standard library.
5. Start writing some code. Ruby Programming Challenge for Newbies (RPCFN) has some challenges you can do.
6. Dive in to one of the Safari Online books for a more in-depth understanding of the language. Beginning Ruby and The Well Grounded Rubyist are both great.

Safari Online Subscription

BYU has a subscription to Safari Online, meaning we have full access to many books online. Here are the most relevant ones to learning Ruby (in approximate order):

1. The Well Grounded Rubyist
2. The Ruby Programming Language (1st ed.) an expanded version of Ruby in a nutshell co-authored by Matz himself.
3. Ruby Best Practices (1st ed.) by Greg Brown of Ruport fame. This is more for when you already know the language and want to learn more about advanced topics like testing, functional programming, and dynamic programming.

Other Resources

1. Coming to Ruby from another language is good if you are already familiar with programming and want to get a basic handle on how Ruby compares to your (previous) language of choice
2. coming from Perl? PLEAC is a translation of the famous Perl Cookbook into Ruby
3. Why's Poignant Guide to Ruby (ch 1) (TOC) is for when you have some spare time and are in the right kind of mood. An amazing and psychotic book that can be surprisingly helpful in really understanding ruby.\
4. Interactive Regex development tool Makes writing your regular expressions super easy. Comes complete with handy tips.