The Rails 4 Way (Addison-Wesley Professional Ruby)

This book is amazing.I jumped into this book pretty green as far as web development is concerned. I have a lot of experience on the front-end but had only dabbled on the back-end. I did have basic Ruby and Rails experience but nothing major. I really wanted to learn my way around Rails but also understand how and why things worked the way they did. This book really helped to answer those questions.The first few chapters were a bit difficult to get through primarily because it was very basic information (configuration, Rails routing, REST, etc.). After that, it got really exciting (for me) as it dove into the specifics of the framework.I highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to learn more about Rails and I think it's suitable for almost any experience level. There are certain topics that were too complex for me to understand in the context of the book, so I used a flashcard as my bookmark and wrote down any concepts that were difficult. Googling it and rereading that section of the book really helped get the point across.If I had to pick one negative about the book, it would be that it is opinionated as far as configuration. This can be assumed, though, because it is documenting the Rails Way. For instance, Haml and Rspec are used extensively over ERb and TestUnit. I had no experience with these prior to the book, but was excited to learn about them because they do seem to be the go-to libraries for big Rails shops (Hashrocket, Thoughtbot, etc.)Overall, 5/5. I've read it once and picked up a lot of knowledge. I plan to use it extensively and re-read sections as needed when an issue arises. If you're a complete beginner, I'd start off with the Hartl tutorial and then go through this book.

This is a great overall book to talk about the mechanics of rails. It is not setup to be a tutorial for a brand new beginner, but rather a more in-depth look at each of the concepts within rails. If you are a beginner, buy this book along with another beginner book to get started (or supplement with online tutorials).

The book is quite good but definitely, as someone said, not a beginners book. You need to be well along your way to really utilize it. As such, it makes a very good reference. The book is very comprehensive but I would say, if your needs are a little more fundamental and you need to be taken through some of the basics in a comprehensive way, Michael Hartl's book does that very, very well - and he's got a real good writing style.My complaint with the book is that the paper used for the book must be about a 12lb bond. It's about as thin as you can get without actually being into something else, like wrapping tissue.

I bought this a few years ago as it appeared to be the most authoritative Rails book available. The official online Rails Guides are organised but terse. I contrast that with the jQuery documentation which does a much better job of helping new users learn.This book has been my main resource since then, but its flaws irk me every time I dive into it so I am writing this to help improve subsequent versions. I should mention that I haven't taken a peek at The Rails 5 Way yet, which is currently available.On the positive side, it's a long book printed on thin paper, so you get a lot for your money. It also covers all the main topics you could possibly want.The book is written by more than one person, so the clarity of the text and examples varies from one chapter to the next. The authors obviously know their stuff, making many references to prior versions of Rails which will no doubt be helpful to others like them who have been Rails users for a long time. They are good at suggesting and covering gems vs hand-coding throughout the book.On the downside, the authors resort to HAML and CoffeeScript in many of their examples. For the majority of developers who know their HTML and Javascript, having to learn two more languages you don't intend to use just to be able to get your head around Rails is a huge turn-off. There is a 15-page chapter on HAML in the middle of the book which will no doubt help those who are inclined to read it.Secondly the index is poor. For example there is no index entry for "permit", which is fundamental to handling Rails parameters, or "polymorphic" which is covered on pages 209, 287-290, 292-6 but has no index entry. My index is therefore filled with my own additions and corrections. I'd have thought someone at Addison Wesley would do a better job of this."The Rails 4 Way" is not for beginners and there are very few Rails books. If you are a beginner you will alas need to start with another resource, such as the online book "Ruby on Rails Tutorial" by Michael Hartl or the various online courses that are now available - I can recommend the one offered by The Pragmatic Studio, although it's a few years old. Having said that, if you want a book to flip through when you can't handle any more screen time, "The Rails 4 Way" - or more likely "The Rails 5 Way" - is worth having.

Although I am a seasoned Rails vet, I imagine this book would also be great for those novices out there. It reads very nicely and has thoroughly covered the major topics surrounding development with Rails.

This is an advanced book. I would recommend first learning Ruby (Beginning Ruby: From Novice to Professional) and then learn about Ruby on Rails (Ruby on Rails Tutorial: Learn Web Development with Rails (3rd Edition)) and then pick up this book. It's a great book to dive deeper about Rails.

This is the de facto desktop reference for rails 4. Note this isn't a tutorial style book, and it assumes you have worked with and have knowledge of Ruby on Rails. Keeping all that in mind, this can be a handy reference to have around if you like a paper books more than framework docs.

Ottimo libro e ottima guida per chi già ha qualche conoscenza di Ruby.E' una sorta di manuale, utile per approfondire alcuni aspetti di RoR.Consigliato.

If you just starting Rails developing this book will teach you nothing. It is a glorified reference book with sporadic examples - better go and read Rails guides.However, this book suits pretty well for "what is there in Rails" - you read like 4 lines about something new and you go off to the internet for a research. This could be useful for intermediate/advanced developers to discover Rails possibilities - but it will require a lot of work from your side.

Ich habe mir das Buch aus zwei Gründen gekauft:1. Um einen tieferen Einblick in Ruby on Rails zu bekommen2. Um ein gutes Nachschlagewerk zur Verfügung zu habenBeide Aufgaben erfüllt das Buch sehr gut. Es ist definitiv kein Einsteiger Buch, da es nach und nach einzelne wichtige Themen wie routes, controller oder Active Record abarbeitet und man für ein Verständnis schon wissen sollte wie die einzelnen Aspekte in der Praxis zusammen arbeiten.Dafür ist es hervorragend um ein tieferes und umfassendes Verständnis der einzelnen Themen zu erhalten. Dadurch, dass es sich auch als Nachschlagewerk versteht sind einzelne Abschnitte wie Funktionslisten oder Referenz-Konfigurationsdateien enthalten, die nicht direkt zum besseren Verständnis beitragen, was ich letztendlich jedoch positiv finde weil es dadurch zu einem Buch wird auf das ich regelmäßig zurückgreifen kann.Für den Rails Veteranen ist sicherlich auch interessant, dass das Buch Hinweise zu Unterschieden zu früheren Rails Versionen enthält.Von mir also klare Kaufempfehlung.