我在Neighborly先生的《谦逊的红宝石小书》的帮助下学会了Ruby。这是一个很好的免费下载的Ruby介绍，有很多例子，我100%推荐。

再等几个月，Simon St. Laurent和Edd Dumbill的《Learning Rails》将于11月问世。那一系列的书是惊人的，这本书将涵盖Rails的最新版本。

学习Ruby的好链接: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Ruby_Programming

请注意，rails世界充斥着大量令人沮丧的过时且不一致的文档和示例。它可能是发展最快、最流行的开发社区之一。当你学到一些东西的时候，它已经改变了。甚至书中所讨论的rails版本也不一致。通过博客记录!足够的说。

我目前在windows上做RoR。我的建议是尽量避开窗户。很多东西都不起作用，rails社区真的真的不关心你。迁移到Git真的把我搞得一团糟，因为它在windows上不能很好地工作。很多宝石会因此而失败(Heroku看起来像一个很酷的工具-对我来说太糟糕了，它不能处理window的Git设置)。卡皮斯特拉诺出局了。这种情况继续下去，令人恼火。

Plus, in the back of your mind, you always wonder when something doesn't work "Is it a rails/windows problem?" I am not sure this is solved by using linux because linux brings its own hassles like constantly having to upgrade all those different dependencies, etc...If that's the kind of thing you enjoy it might be an okay choice for you. Those days of enjoying system fiddling are behind me and I just want to get on with doing my work. I am planning on installing ubuntu on a home machine just so i can get familiar with things like capistrano so maybe my opinion will change.

我强烈建议，如果你打算做rails开发，你应该认真考虑购买一台Mac。如果你珍惜你的时间和理智，它几乎会立即得到回报。你花了10个小时调试windows/linux安装问题，这取决于你如何评估你的时间，你花的钱和Mac电脑的钱一样多。

与它所取代的东西相比，Rails是一种乐趣，但它也有点痛苦，因为它的支持者跳过了许多无聊但重要的东西，如文档、兼容性问题和社区建设。它比Django等其他框架强大得多，但有时我在看Django的文档和社区时，会像一个有狂野性感女友的男人看着他朋友平凡但理智稳定的妻子一样叹息。但是后来rails添加了一个特性，我惊叹道:“哦，太棒了!”

在我看来，Rails的截图比Peepcode的截图要好。RubyPlus也有截图，注意，它们有点粗糙。BuildingWebApps有一个免费的在线课程，课程进行到一半就开始截屏。

我没有编程背景。我自学了PHP，最近加入了一家专门研究Ruby on Rails的公司。他们有一个全面的Rails培训计划，它足够灵活，可以适应我们想要实现的任何更改。虽然我不是rails专家，但我愿意分享我使用rails的经验。我希望这能有所帮助。

以下是我所遵循的路径(结合我所使用的工具)

Start with a simple ruby guide. It will help a lot, since entire rails framework revolves around classes and objects. Environment and OS are not important. Though I am working on a Mac, I frequently work on Linux and Windows, and I do not face any problems. Start with a good book which explains using a demo app. [I am using Agile Web Development with Rails - By The Pragmatic Bookshelf]. There are many other good books as well. Once you are done with the application, you will have a good idea of the framework. Try to understand the SQL queries generated by Active Record module. Go through the Rails Guides. You will find the framework a lot easier. Keep practicing.

几个关键点

It takes years to learn a language completely. So be patient and do not stop learning. Go through rails api as when required. [While developing your first app] Google the things which you do not understand. People have written great articles on almost all topics. Use Stackoverflow :-) [Only when you are not able to find the solution on your own.] Load railscasts on your phone or video player. Watch 'em while travelling or in your free time. They are of few minutes each. You will learn a great deal of things and also learn the best way of doing things.

工具

Shell[在Mac和Ubuntu中] 编辑器[Mac中的Textmate, Ubuntu中的Gedit和Windows中的notepad++] 安装了Firebug的Firefox进行测试。

最后我有一句话要说“继续努力”。愿一切都好！

任何Rails的uber源都是http://www.rubyonrails.org/，如果站点上没有，你可能不需要它。

一个快速的食谱是Ruby on Rails: Up and Running，你可以从O'Rielly或搜索谷歌获得在线版本。他们带你了解Rails的约定，并使用Instant Rails，这是可以的。

更好的Rails书籍“敏捷Web开发与Rails”，这是Rails的汤到坚果。它会引导你下载和设置Rails、Gems等等。

如果你是一个Java“家伙”，想要一本过渡的书O' reilly有“Rails for Java Developers”http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780977616695/?CMP=AFC-ak_book&ATT=Rails+for+Java+Developers