RubyMine Review
In my endless pursuit of more productivity, I decided to give the latest RubyMine IDE one more chance. I’ll make this review nice and concise by listing the pro’s and con’s.
Pro’s
- Helps stimulate the economy by giving $99 to JetBrains.
- Its sluggishness gives you more time to think.
- You get a great exercise from using your mouse since you have to constantly scroll to the right to see the rest of the code. That’s right, no wordwrap.
- You get to install gems that does not appear anywhere in the code, even the Windows gems although these does not get installed on my Mac or Linux.
Con’s
- When evaluating my existing projects, “refactor” does not work.
- I get full of red dotted lines underneath constants and variables, even after “indexing”.
Conclusion
Nice try, but I’ll stick to VIM and TextMate.
Burst.net Day 1
I’m somewhat shocked that even though it’s a weekend, Burst.net got my server up and running within 24 hours. Very nice!
I logged onto the machine and it’s a minimal Ubuntu 8.04 64-bit server, just as I ordered. I really liked the fact that they didn’t install anything and it’s a clean machine for me to configure, the way I like it. I quickly installed Apache, Postgres, Ruby, Passenger, and REE (Ruby Enterprise Edition). The network is really fast and the machine is just incredible. With 1TB, I now use this server to serve up my Git repositories.
I verified the processor and the memory. I just can’t believe that I now have enough processing power along with the memory to make my apps really shine, all at a price of a VPS!
It’s a good start, and we’ll see what happens next few weeks.
Meet MacRuby by Peepcode
I just downloaded and and viewed “Meet MacRuby” from Peepcode, and I must say, I’m extremely impressed with the content as well as the production value. Geoffrey has gotten considerably better with each screencast over the years and I assure you that you’ll be amazed with this one. It’s worth well over its $9 price tag.
As a former Obj-C programmer, I have certain bias towards using anything other than Obj-C for Cocoa programming, but MacRuby appears to be the future. I’m somewhat sick of Ruby being used strictly for web programming and it’s about time Ruby gets used for other areas. MacRuby and Cocoa does not appear to be a small step, but a giant leap towards that goal.
I only have two words for this screencast, GET IT!
Envycasts – Just Amazing!
If you’re really serious about learning and want to improve your skills, please check out Envycasts.
The latest episode has really great set of information on improving performance and scaling. Two other episodes are Advanced ActiveRecord and Rails 2.2 and they’re really really good. I don’t want to sound like a salesperson for them, but I guarantee that you’ll feel the same way after viewing them.
I was extremely impressed with the production value of the whole thing. It’s not just staring at the screen or a slide presentation. You actually see Gregg and Jason along with awesome animations. They also don’t sound like they’re suffering from constipation unlike, well…
The price is $9 per episode but I actually feel bad that they’re not charging more. Yes, it’s that good folks!
The Best Keyboard Ever!
I just bit the bullet and got the das keyboard. I know it costs $129, but I just love the tactile feel of the mechanical keys. I’ve been trying to get something close to what I get with the mechanical keys, but it’s just not the same.
First of all, I type much faster and more accurately on this keyboard. Some people complain about the loud sound, but I really enjoy the sound as it reminds of the good old days when the keyboards were made correctly.
This keyboard only takes one USB port, unlike Matias which takes two. That’s really added convenience.
It’s obviously made for Windows, but works without a hitch with my Mac. The “Windows” key is equivalent to the command key, which gets little getting used to.
After going through so many keyboards, I can finally say that I found my keyboard for life and yes, it is the best keyboard ever!
Ruby Metaprogramming Screencast
I’ve always said that watching is much better than reading when it comes to learning. With the use of technologies around us these days, it’s a crime to learn using old outdated medium like the paper. We should be utilizing both hearing and seeing.
When I found out that Pragmatic Bookshelf produced screencasts, I immediately jumped. I got both Erlang and Dave Thomas’ Ruby Metaprogramming screencasts. I’m extremely impressed with the quality of the video as well as the contents. All I can say is that you should try them out for yourself, especially at $5 per episode, there’s really nothing to think about.
I just can’t wait until they produce more of these. In fact, I hope they ditch the book publishing and go all video. Yes, it’s that good.
TextMate Equivalent for Linux?
*** Major Update ***
I created a screencast here: http://www.rubyhead.com/2009/04/24/komodo-edit-textmate-alternative/
Please see my post here: http://www.rubyhead.com/2009/02/20/search-is-over-textmate-equivalent-and-more-for-linux-windows/
*******
I’ve been struggling to find a text editor for Ruby/Rails development on Ubuntu. I even went as far as make gedit look like TextMate. However, it’s just not the same.
The thing that I should’ve done was to look for the best tool, not the best text editor.
It didn’t take much convincing for me to install NetBeans. I’m just glad that all the bitching I did about NetBeans are gone with my lost archive of blog posting from several years back. NetBeans has improved so much since the early days. And no, it’s not just about Java. It supports Ruby and Rails beautifully. It even gave me a glimpse of Intellisense from my days in Microsoft world.
*** Update ***
I now use geany with file browser plugin. Granted it’s not TextMate, but I’m loving it at this time!!! Take a look at it at http://geany.uvena.de and judge for yourself.
Advanced Rails
The one thing I really love about being a subscriber of Oreilly’s Safari is that I get to read the latest books without going broke. Naturally, I was delighted when Advance Rails by Brad Ediger.
As the title suggests, it covers the “advanced” topics. I never really understood what made a topic advanced, but as far as I’m concerned, it just means that topics haven’t been covered in other books. By my definition, this book isn’t so advanced. If you’re a regular subscriber to the forums and the mailing lists, then you’d be aware of all the topics covered by this book.
Rather than being a tutorial that spoon feeds, this book is more like a guide that gives high-level overview and directs to where you need to look. I almost forgot that I was reading a book, not a blog. It’s also not shy about assuming the fact that the readers already know Rails.
I’m not sure if I’d recommend this book if you had to pay money for it. I got this feeling that the book was rushed, but then again, that’s usually the case for computer books these days.
PayPerPost – Rails App
I found PerPerPost.com while surfing the web and reading fellow Microsoft refugee Peter Wright’s blog. He mentioned the company he works for and creating a system using Ruby on Rails. I immediately wanted to find out what it is.
It’s a website that pays bloggers for writing about a products and services. It’s a nice way to monetize the blog and serves as a great advertising vehicle. I really like the idea, but at the same time, little spooked by the fact that blogs may become something of late-night infomercials. In fact, I will be paid for this post (fingers crossed).
Things That Suck
I found the performance of the website to be incredibly poor. The pages load so slow that it reminds me of the days when I used telephone to connect to the Internet. I pay extra for increase in bandwidth for my FiOS and it angers me to think that my money is wasted. It really doesn’t boast well for Ruby on Rails.
The site is also very buggy. I can’t even change my password. Take a look at the error message I get when I submit the change password form.
I’m now stuck with a weird password, yet the developers call themselves “Code Ninja” according to their video blog at http://www.rockstartup.com.
I guess things will change as they get more advertisers, but I really couldn’t find anything that I can post here. Their products and services are similar to what you’d find in your spam filter inbox. On top of that, in order for my account to be active, it had to go through a manual review process. I don’t mind the wait as long as it’s quick, but it took over a week before I heard anything back.
Good Stuff
I like the concept of allowing casual bloggers to monetize their efforts.
Conclusion
I hope Peter and his company can improve the performance and eliminate the bugs. I also hope that this company does well and become a poster child for Ruby on Rails, not an example of why RoR sucks. Unless they add more products and services that are relevant to the subject of this blog, it will most likely be the last post for me.
Book By Its Cover
I stopped by B&N while Christmas shopping with my family to see what’s on shelf for Ruby and Rails. It appears that every books are there except for one that I think is the best and the most important book, Ruby for Rails by David Black. I was somewhat stunned and saddened by this because I think it is the most definitive guide to Ruby and Rails.
Here are some of my initial thoughts as why this book wasn’t on the shelf:
- It’s all sold out and they can’t keep it in stock. Although I highly doubt this since I saw a post where David is explaining the book is titled “Ruby for Rails” and not AWDR.
- People don’t understand that you need to learn Ruby to be effective Rails programmer.
- It has the ugliest cover I’ve ever seen.
- David Black is not loved. Considering how he’s contributing to Ruby community, I just don’t see how this is possible.
The conclusion I came to is that even though the book has the best content, it’s the cover that sells the book. I’m not sure what Manning is thinking, but they should really consider revising the cover. If you ever come across this book, buy it. I can’t think of any other book that covers Rails in details like this one.
