Re: How to run a program (Newbie)

On 11/19/2011 10:09 PM, Otto Dydakt wrote:
> Another newbie question here:
> 
> So: I've installed ruby. I've got the command prompt set up. If I run
> "puts 1" it returns "1" and "puts 1+2" returns 3. All seems good.
> 
> Then I use SciTE to write a program called "calc.rb" The only line in
> "calc.rb" is "puts 1+2" and I expect that it will return "3"
> 
> I get to the command prompt, which says "C:\Users\Otto>"
> 
> I type "irb" to get into the ruby prompt, changing the prompt to
> "irb<main>:001:0>"
> 
> The question is: how do I run the calc.rb program?
> 
> My tutorial book says that I should type "ruby calc.rb" but this returns
> "NameError: undefined local variable or method 'calc' for main:Object
> from <irb>:1
> 
> What am I doing wrong?

The command your book tells you to run should not be performed in irb.
It should be performed at the command prompt you saw before you ran irb.
 In addition, your calc.rb file needs to be saved to the same directory
that your command prompt is indicating to you.

That command tells the command processor to run a program named "ruby"
and to pass the string "calc.rb" as an argument.  This is a pretty basic
usage of the command processor for Windows, and you may find it helpful
to learn a bit about the command processor itself while you're learning
Ruby.

It seems that the book you're using is pretty vague about these kinds of
specifics since you didn't know about the need to run irb the other day
when you wanted to do "puts 1+2".  What is the title of this book, and
have you considered looking for a different book?

Even if the book is really good for other people, maybe you just need an
author that speaks to you better.  There are many people here who can
help you find other reference material that might be easier for you to
use. :-)

-Jeremy