From: 7stud -- Date: 2011-08-29T09:42:40+09:00 Subject: Re: The proper version of Ruby on Rails Jason Hsu wrote in post #1018960: > I'm going through the book _Head First Rails_, and I can't even make it > through the first chapter, because I can't get everything working. > > Part of the problem is that I don't know what versions of Rails and Ruby > I'm supposed to be using. I've read that every Ruby on Rails book is > geared towards certain versions of Rails and Ruby, and if you're using > the wrong version of something, you're busted. Unfortunately, the _Head > First Rails_ book doesn't even specify what versions to use. > > Why does Ruby on Rails change so much from version to version? This > wasn't a problem with Python or other languages. > Sure it was/is. The relatively recent upgrade from python 2.6 to python 3 required a lot of changes. Personally, I hate python 3. Both python and ruby are in a state of major flux right now because of major upgrades and subsequent fixes to those upgrades. Ruby upgraded from 1.8.6 to ruby 1.9+, and ruby 1.8.7 is a bastardization of ruby 1.8.6 and ruby 1.9 that includes some of the features of ruby 1.9 added to 1.8.6. > I'm going through the book _Head First Rails_, and I can't even make it > through the first chapter, because I can't get everything working. > Using rails requires installing a lot of stuff, and there are so many different operating systems it is hard to get all the programs working correctly with every system. However, if you are using one of the common OS's, then you should be able to get things working relatively easily. > > Am I even using a good book? > It's three years old. Would you recommend that someone start learning python with a book that's three years old? > Should I try another book instead, or > would I still face the same issues? The problems you are running into are probably due to the fact that somewhere one of your gems/packages depends on another gem, and it tells rubygems to go out and download the latest version of that gem. While that may have been fine 3 years ago, that gem may have changed a lot in the meantime, and therefore it is incompatible with other gems. The better, more modern practice is for gems to require that their dependencies be a certain version or range of versions. That way if the gem gets updated, the old version, which is known to work with the other gems, will get installed. If you want to take a look at one of the most recent beginning rails books, which also gets good reviews, go here: http://ruby.railstutorial.org/ruby-on-rails-tutorial-book However, be warned: the amount of stuff you have to install is staggering. That book also teaches you testing right from the beginning, so you might think you are reading a book about testing rather than rails programming. But ruby is such a flexible language, and rails is such a big framework, you need to write tests to keep code changes from permeating errors throughout the entire structure. -- Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.