There I was, sitting at my desk looking over the upcoming article schedule for Rubysource, when I realized I had inadvertently published TWO articles on Wednesday. The immediate consequence of my stupidity is we’d have no article to run on Friday (we try to publish M-W-F around here) and I’d have to fend off a bunch of different questions that all had the same answer: “Because I am stupid.”
It’s our reaction in times of high adversity that define who we are as managing editors. Our first reaction was to smash our head on the desk while coming up with various adjectives about ourselves. Our second reaction was, inexplicably, to start referring to ourselves in plural third person, like royalty. Er, um… (coughs) with those reactions behind me, I had the grand idea of quickly creating a post of things that are going on in Ruby. Yes, it’s the blog version of a flashback show.
Objects on Rails
The venerable Avdi Grimm has started work on his second self-published book on Ruby entitled “Objects on Rails.” For those that are unfamiliar with Avdi, he is a Ruby Rogue, author of Exceptional Ruby, and one crazy smart cat. You can get an as-he-is-writing-it copy of “Objects on Rails” now for about the cost of a Starbucks Salted Caramel Mocha (skinny!). The book has it’s own Google Group where other Big Ruby Brains discuss its merits and help Avdi make it even more super-fantastic. Check it out.
Gitdocs
I found this one on Rubyflow, where I find a ton of great Ruby content. The folks over at Miso Engineering have created GitDocs, claiming to be “Open source Dropbox using Ruby and Git.” At Miso, they are using it to track everything from docs to snippets to notes to crackers. OK, I made that last one up, but you get the idea. Give it a try and see if it’ll work for your team.
SitePoint
The folks at SitePoint (Hi Boss!) have started their annual Christmas Countdown Sale where you can get unBUHLEAVEable deals on SitePoint content (the “awesome” is implied). If you think we’re just trying to sell SitePoint wares because Rubysource is part of the SitePoint.com network, well, um, didja SEE the SALE? It’s awesome, even if it is possibly shameless self-promotion/kissing up.
Ruby Reading List
Russ Olsen over at InformIT has compiled an impressive Ruby Reading List that has books for every programming skill level. Even mine! Back in my day, when I was just starting out, we didn’t have fancy reading lists where your roadmap to Ruby Ninja-hood was just GIVEN TO YOU. *coughs*…Sorry, went all curmudgeon on you there for a sec….Anyway, it’s a great post and list and you should read it.
What’s in a Name?
Evan Light (you know, the guy that I paired with awhile back? Yes, THAT Evan Light.) has a post on what to name things in your code. Evan goes on to prove that what you name classes and methods is REALLY important. This post goes great with the book I am reading (“Clean Code,” by Uncle Bob Martin) so it struck a chord with me. Oh, and I am fond enough of Evan to make him a bit nervous…
Location, Location, Geo-Rails
You might have guessed that I am a total sucker for all things location, so I was teen-girl-screaming excited about Daniel Azuma’s series on Geo-Rails. Daniel dives into RGeo and PostGIS and OMG I am so excited. I might even have to steal some of his ideas for Loccasions…
Practice Makes Perfect
In our last happening, Gregory Brown and Practicing Ruby turned 3 months old recently. Well, PracticingRuby is 3 months old. I don’t know how old Gregory is, but I hope it’s more than three months. If an infant knows that much more about Ruby than I do, it may be time for me to apply for that mega-store greeter job. Anyway, if you haven’t checked out PracticingRuby, you should. It’s a great site.
So, that wraps up some happenings in our smashing Ruby community this week. If you enjoyed this post or got something out of it, you can be sure I’ll do something similar the next time I screw up the scheduling of our articles.
Hack out!
Glenn GoodrichGlenn works for Skookum Digital Works by day and manages the SitePoint Ruby channel at night. He likes to pretend he has a secret identity, but can't come up with a good superhero name. He's settling for "Roob", for now.
