Write code for the 21st century

This is a sweet book. The first edition got me hooked on Ruby; this edition is even better. Explaining a programming language can be a tough task. The authors do an outstanding job of presenting both the gory details and the elegant underpinnings of the language.

Ruby is more accessible and easier to pick up than Python, Perl, or Java, with a cleaner, more intuitive design. The book will get into the language, guide you through syntax and style, and leave with good language comprehension.

The reference section can, at times, be a bit terse, but the due to the number of libraries that are built in to the language, a certain amount of brevity is required to keep the book to a manageable size. Distributed computing? Built in. XML parsing? Built in. HTTP server? Built in. Hell, you could almost write amazon.com in Ruby and never need a 3rd-party lib.

Get the book, and write code for the 21st century.

Other Reviews

• Good but weak in places.
• extremely well balanced review of an emergent gem
• Write code for the 21st century
• Quick and effective introduction to Ruby
• A nice fun book for programmers