From: James Edward Gray II <james@...>
Date: 2005-03-22T22:49:43+09:00
Subject: Re: Ruby newbie: 3 week learning project

On Mar 21, 2005, at 10:49 PM, Al Abut - alabut.com wrote:

> Plus I figure that it's more of a natural progress to go from initially
> learning a language to moving on to mastering the advanced concepts.
> And although I appreciate their advice, I've noticed that the people
> recommending "Pragmatic Programming" tend to already be advanced
> programmers in more complicated languages who are "stepping down" to
> Ruby, rather than designers like myself that are climbing the other way
> up the tree and adding programming arrows to their quiver.

Yes, the Pickaxe is written for experienced programmers, in my opinion. 
  It assumes you have a good amount of knowledge going in, like a fair 
grasp of object oriented programing.

I haven't read the other book, but it wouldn't surprise me if it's a 
better volume for beginners.  However, it would surprise me a lot if it 
covered Ruby as in depth as the Pickaxe does.  If the Pickaxe isn't the 
first book you go through, make sure it's the second.  ;)

James Edward Gray II

P.S.  Hal Fulton's The Ruby Way is a little dated, but chalked full of 
practical Ruby code.  I enjoyed it as well.