[jayrobin]

I was in a sort of similar position a few months back and did the EDX.org Software as a Service course with the end goal of learning Rails. I was able to complete the set work and pass with a good grade, but Rails never really clicked for me (I think partially because Ruby felt so different to what I was used to).

I put it to the side for a while, then recently decided to try again. This time I spent a little time getting used to Ruby (via codecademy.com and a few small personal projects), then doing the Hartl tutorial. What worked best for me was taking intermittent breaks in the tutorial to go off and implement something on my own from scratch.

For example, after chapter 3 I created a basic, one-page app [1]. Later in the tutorial, I made a pretty terrible To-Do list app [2] that nonetheless helped me finally understand MVC. After finishing the tutorial I signed up to codeschool.com and did a couple of the Ruby, Rails and testing tracks just to revise what I'd been learning.

I'm still a complete beginner, but I'm thoroughly enjoying working with Rails now and am making good progress working on a much bigger project.

* [1] http://jayrobin-yield-calculator.herokuapp.com/ * [2] http://jayrobin-todo.herokuapp.com/

[scubasteve]

I think that's the biggest key, to implement what you learn. I think now I have a good idea of smaller projects I want to work on, with a bigger project in mind. This was a great motivator. I never felt like I could finish a small app after chapter 3. I'll definitely have to go back and think through it this time around. Thanks!

[jayrobin]

When I say a 'basic, one-page app' I just mean a controller serving static content (i.e. not even any models), which is the main topic of Hartl ch3. The point was really to try creating anything from scratch - starting with a newly generated rails project, creating the controller, setting up the routes, developing the page, all the way to actually deploying it on Heroku. It may not be pretty and it may be just a single page, but it was a fantastic feeling to actually build something of my own from nothing in Rails and see it live.