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by helen842000 4991 days ago
I'm glad you start from a 'what you'll need' point of view. This is often missed in most books where they just start with a code 1+1 example.

If you are aiming for total beginners - as in, new to programming and not just new to Ruby/Rails then you might have to re-word your About this book section.

You mention TDD, Git, 'default Ruby stack' within the first 8 lines of the book. While these are important points regarding the book - they only make sense to programmers of some kind.

I think if you give away a sample chapter of your book then this will be the first thing they read. You've got to convince the new folks you'll look after them & that they will actually get as far as building their first app. You may want to consider adding a book subtitle. I presume the readers you want to attract might not even know what Rails is! Maybe something like - Anyone Can Ride Rails - A fresh programming guide for enthusiasic beginners.

I like the informal tone as it's reassuring. I also second the what is Ruby/Rails & why should I use them, what can I build with it etc?

1 comments

Hi Helen - thank you for the feedback, you make some great points!

I definitely need to iron out who the target market is, but for the time being I have expanded the note to include "(though you are introduced to these topics later – so don't panic if you don't know what they are just yet)."

I think I had envisaged that people coming to this book would have already made their minds up about learning Rails and perhaps already looked at some of the other books but felt a bit out of their depth - so would have probably come across some of the terms. Hence I though that I'd keep the more in-depth explanations to their respective chapters. But yeah I totally see what you mean so I may have to rethink that! Thanks again for the feedback.

Hey Aston,

Glad to be of help. As a side note did you use a template for your ebook at all to get started? The headings look great & it has a nice flow, thanks.

Hi Helen, I didn't use a template - it's just a bog standard Open Office document and exported as a PDF :)