Customer Reviews

Ruby Pocket Reference (Pocket Reference (O'Reilly))

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is a handy reference and guide to the Ruby programming language. Small and lightweight, it would be at home in a laptop bag.

I program in several languages (lately: Ruby, Java, XHTML, CSS, JavaScript). A quick reference book like this is helpful when switching contexts, reminding me of the syntax or method call that has slipped my mind.

The explanations and examples concisely illustrate the language concepts. Tables list (often all of) things like pre-defined variables, global constants, etc.

An experienced programmer could learn the important basics of Ruby in a quick scan of the first 60 pages. However, I would still recommend reading one of the thorough tutorial books to get an in-depth understanding of some of the more unique Ruby techniques.

In addition to the items covered in the product description, the book includes:

* The most commonly used areas of the File and IO classes.

* A glossary of Ruby specific terms.

* RDoc, the utility for extracting documentation embedded in comments in Ruby source, and the basics of formatting your comments for RDoc.

* A thorough 20 page index including all of the special characters (punctuation) in use in Ruby. Very handy when trying to read someone else's code.

* Many links to Ruby resources on the web.

Note that the Amazon book description should read "sprintf and time formatting *directives*". That is, the special character combination for formatting strings and the output of time.

You probably could learn Ruby from this handy little pocket guide, but I wouldn't advise trying it. The examples are much too short and sweet to really do a good job of it. For the experienced Ruby programmer, though, it is a great reference on all aspects of the language. It even has introductory material on how to get started running Ruby, plus some bonus material at the end on RubyGems, Rake, and a listing of additional Ruby resources - some online and some that are books. RubyGems is a package utility for Ruby that installs Ruby software packages and keeps them up to date. It is even easier to use than tools like the Unix/Linux tar utility or Java's jar utility. Rake is a build tool that helps you build, compile, or otherwise process files, sometimes large numbers of them. Rake is similar to "make" and Apache ant, but is written in Ruby. Rails operations use Rake frequently.

The only negative thing I can say is that it seems like the book was hastily edited. I haven't seen any errors in the technical directions yet, but I have caught more than a few grammar errors and odd repetitions in the regular text that might have you scratching your head and wondering what the author meant. The following is the table of contents:

Chapter 1. Ruby Pocket Reference
Section 1.1. Conventions Used in This Book
Section 1.2. Comments and Questions
Section 1.3. Acknowledgments
Section 1.4. Running Ruby
Section 1.5. Reserved Words
Section 1.6. Operators
Section 1.7. Comments
Section 1.8. Numbers
Section 1.9. Variables
Section 1.10. Symbols
Section 1.11. Predefined Variables
Section 1.12. Pseudovariables
Section 1.13. Global Constants
Section 1.14. Ranges
Section 1.15. Methods
Section 1.16. Conditional Statements
Section 1.17. Classes
Section 1.18. Files
Section 1.19. The IO Class
Section 1.20. Exception Handling
Section 1.21. Object Class
Section 1.22. Kernel Module
Section 1.23. String Class
Section 1.24. Array Class
Section 1.25. Hash Class
Section 1.26. Time Formatting Directives
Section 1.27. Interactive Ruby (irb)
Section 1.28. Ruby Debugger
Section 1.29. Ruby Documentation
Section 1.30. RDoc Options
Section 1.31. RubyGems
Section 1.32. Rake
Section 1.33. Ruby Resources
Section 1.34. Glossary

150 pages, really fits in a pocket. Well written, great reference, could serve as a tutorial in a pinch.

Michael Fitzgerald's RUBY provides an excellent quick programmer's reference to Ruby which is organized for speedy consultation. From lists of methods to predefined variables, RUBY POCKET REFERENCE is not only a top pick for libraries, but for working Ruby programmers who want a pocket at-a-glance guide.

Even with internet resources and other Ruby books available, I refer to this every time I write something in Ruby. New users will find it easy to follow and advanced users will find it well structured ans easy to find things that they need.

Okay. Most if not all of the information in this available for free online somewhere, but sometimes I just want to give my eyes a rest from the monitor. I bought this book for a quick, right next to the mouse, reference and as a proactive time killer. The form factor is good.

But there are too many errors that are obvious even to me, an amateur programmer and a rank beginner at ruby.

For example, on page 73:

puts "The value of x is #{x}.

See how that string is only enclosed in one parenthesis? The frequency at which these types of errors occur really undermines the credibility of the whole text. It's kind of like when the TV news reports on a story you were involved in, and they get the facts so wrong, you can never believe anything the broadcast again.

Anyway, the book is still pretty small and beats playing snake.