Ruby on Rails - a few questions?

Question

Ruby on Rails - a few questions?

Answer 1

Yes.

Answer 2

I don't think you've really understood what Ruby on Rails is.



RoR is not a content management system (CMS) like Joomla or Drupal. It's a way of creating web-based applications using the Ruby programming language. This means that you have to do a fair bit of programming to achieve anything.



The Rails part of RoR makes the standard parts like getting data out of a database and serving up to a web page easy, but you still need to actually write program code.



Because it's not a CMS, the answer to all your questions about whether it can do something is "Yes" - as long as you program it to do that. It doesn't do anything out of the box.



Rails is a great system, and so are the other web frameworks like the one I use, Django, which is the same idea as RoR but using Python rather than Ruby. But to be honest, if you're not a programmer, you would be better off with Joomla or Drupal.

Answer 3

Ruby on Rails will rule the internet soon :)



It is fast to learn. Get the Pragmatic programmers book: Agile Web Development with Ruby on Rails.



1) I have programming experience... So I can not answer #1. It depends on how you learn. Everyone learns different, so I can not say if you would learn it easy or not. It is easy as any other language. much easier to learn that php I believe, which is the main other option right now.



2) Every system has SOME security flaws. A recent flaw was discovered in Ruby(not rails) that has been fixed. Rails has none that I am away of, if you set up your system correctly.



3) I could do it in 3 days :) someone that does know what they are doing yet would take longer. A good thing about rails is you can just get one feature working and then add in the rest as you go.



4) I use it everyday. I use it at work 40-50 hours a week then I use it on my freelance projects also. I do use other languages, but I really like ruby on rails for most interactive websites. HIGHLY RECOMMEND



5) I am not sure what you mean. RoR should run on a mongrel. Mongrels take up a lot of disk space, depending on your application size. So large applications have to move to larger servers soon. That is one issue. php programmer can put 100 different apps on a server, while a Rails programmer can not.



6) More and more are coming over to the rails side because that is what there customers want.

www.a2hosting.com is my host. For $18/month I get 3 mongrels.. mongrels are the faster way to go with rails right now. for one mongrel I think is only about $10/month. you need atleast one mongrel per application.

www.dreamhost.com has rails abilities but using fast CGI it is slower and harder to set up. But it is cheaper. maybe $5-7 /month

www.engineyard.com is the way to go is cost is no object. My company has 4 servers there. but it is about $1000/month I think



7) yes, there is EASY error checking in rails. It is called validation. here is someones blog about it:

http://beust.com/weblog/archives/000345.html



8) raw code. WYSIWYG is for babies. Ruby on rails is a programming language. Not a CMS.



more info? Railscasts is a good way to learn and see what you are in for. http://railscasts.com/ watch a few of the EARLY episodes and see what you are in for.