Re: Totally lost in learning Ruby

Hilary Bailey wrote in post #981001:
> So Mike,
> Since a database seems to be the bulk on the creation of a my intended
> Ed web application/software, should I consider the SQLs or just use the
> LibreOffice Base along with its Spreadsheet.

I think what the essence of your application is, is to get people to
submit various data, and then you want to aggregate that to a) detect
correlations and b) measure individuals/groups against all or some other
individuals or groups.

This is the bread-and-butter of corporate life and the Sofware King in
this domain is Excel, or perhaps The Software Capo di tutti Capi.

They don't use Java. They don't use C#, and they certainly don't use
Ruby.

The great thing about Excel (or OpenOffice) is that everyone knows how
to use it. If not, they can ask the person sitting next to them.

To be honest, it's not really a database problem. Obviously a database
can play a part but you are not maintaining complex relationships and
business rules. You are looking for patterns.

I am developing multi-million international web sites. They are written
by a team of highly trained .NET programmers. There's not a spreadsheet
to be seen in the applications but underneath, that's where at least
some of the data came from originally.

So I guess Step 1 is to build your model in an office suite. It would be
quite ambitious to just launch something without prototyping the model.

Unfortunately I doubt it's easy to 'publish' your app either as a GUI or
Web product. You'd need to start again. Which brings us back to
something like Rails, an app generator like Mendix, or going on the
Internet and getting somebody to write it for you in India.

I wouldn't be on this channel if I didn't think Ruby was as easy as
other full-strength platforms to do a proper web site. My obsession in
life is to do the least possible in any context.

I'll give you an analogy - I think you're wanting to go on holiday to
Hawaii but assuming you first need to become a trained commercial pilot.
Consider letting someone/something else do the delivery, leaving you to
plan the content.

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