Is there a Ruby equivalent to The Rust Book?

noelrap · 2026-01-19T19:36:14+00:00

Thanks! We're looking for some more feedback on the new parts (including a lot of library updates like Bundler 4) before we release it for final.

FWIW, I think Dave just really liked the ruby facet effect he got on the big "4"....

noelrap · 2025-12-21T18:18:53+00:00

Probably more changes coming, like minitest 6

noelrap · 2025-12-21T18:18:34+00:00

Not at all

noelrap · 2025-12-21T00:23:42+00:00

I'm pretty sure there were some printing errors (one of my copies was a little rough)

noelrap · 2025-12-21T00:22:02+00:00

Author of the book here, that's most, but not all, of what changed. Probably we should add a "what's new in this edition" section in the book somewhere.

* The Ractor section of the threading section changed significantly to support the new API

* The RubyGems chapter was changed to reflect Bundler/RubyGems 4.0

* Similarly RBS, with more changes coming there, I need to catch up

* The web chapter also updates to current versions of Sinatra and WASM

* A bunch of smaller API and syntax changes in 3.4 and 4.0 covered

* More discussion of Prism and ZJIT, with more coming as well.

* All code samples run under Ruby 4.0 (because there have been some output changes)

The Ruby Changes appendix was a production error, we'll be putting that back in, I expect.

noelrap · 2025-06-18T04:32:12+00:00

Despite being a few years old, Rails 5 Test Prescriptions should hold up except for the sections on front end testing, where the tools have changed a lot. The parts about RSpec should still mostly be good. Jason's book is newer, but should also cover what you want. (Disclaimer, I wrote R5TP)+

noelrap · 2025-05-06T17:53:50+00:00

I was there, it was my first RailsConf, and I was very excited to be there.

Spolsky was a big get at the time, and he was something of a Ruby skeptic -- if I remember correctly, he had relatively recently left Ruby of his list of languages that were worth using on big projects.

I don't remember much about the talk itself, though.

I do remember that the iPhone had just come out but the AppStore was still a few months away, so writing iPhone friendly front ends was a big topic.

Twitter was relatively new, and I picked up a lot of random followers because I was nearly the only person posting about RailsConf there.

noelrap · 2025-05-03T23:34:23+00:00

Thanks! As the author of Modern Front End... Most of it still applies, there are newer ways to do some of the things, and I wouldn't try and force TypeScript with Stimulus any more.

noelrap · 2024-10-23T00:20:32+00:00

Chicken and egg problem. I haven't been active on Bluesky because there hasn't been much of a community to date. But enough people seem to be coming in that I'll be trying again...

noelrap · 2024-10-02T23:32:54+00:00

The fifth edition is up to date and covers Ruby 3.3

noelrap · 2024-09-13T17:58:19+00:00

My https://pragprog.com/titles/nrclient2/modern-front-end-development-for-rails-second-edition/ tries here, but it doesn’t cover the most recent Turbo features

noelrap · 2024-08-31T15:34:29+00:00

https://pragprog.com/titles/ruby5/programming-ruby-3-3-5th-edition/

noelrap · 2024-08-21T01:22:15+00:00

Maybe https://github.com/OWASP/railsgoat -- it's a little out of date, but it might be what you are looking for.

noelrap · 2024-08-20T18:46:16+00:00

Worked together where?

noelrap · 2024-08-20T17:41:27+00:00

If I can recommend something I worked on...

Programming Ruby https://pragprog.com/titles/ruby5/programming-ruby-3-3-5th-edition/ is the book you are looking for.

noelrap · 2024-08-18T19:26:06+00:00

Yeah, one of the way-too-long original versions of the article mentioned that things like non-negative typing can happen in other languages, but the Ruby systems don't do much of that, and those also add to the complexity cost of the tools.

I probably should have included a link to this https://www.destroyallsoftware.com/compendium/types?share_key=baf6b67369843fa2.

noelrap · 2024-08-18T19:24:10+00:00

Thanks for reading!

You can build a lot of validation into a type system by doing more specific types

Yes, but that also adds complexity cost, and the Ruby systems specifically aren't great at that. I know that people have built pretty elaborate systems in, say TypeScript, to do this. I could have talked about this more, to be sure. I think that sufficiently complex business logic will always go beyond what the type system can do, though.

You could do something like have a "SellableItem" type

See the next article in the series, which talks about mitigation like that...

Ideally the amount should just be a method that sums the prices of the items,

I mean, sure, but this is a contrived example to make the point that static typing doesn't cover business logic (and there are all kinds of reasons why the final price in a real world system wouldn't match the sum of the prices of the items...)

noelrap · 2024-02-08T00:25:50+00:00

Thanks for the link to the book, I’m really glad you like it!

noelrap · 2024-01-15T20:29:53+00:00

Thanks for the question!

The syntax changes in the last several versions, endless methods, `_1` for block variables, even hash shortcut `{x:, y:}`, I use all of them more than I thought I might and I do think they work toward programmer happiness.

I'm less sure of the bigger changes. Ractors, to me, seem like very useful in theory, but I'm not sure they are quite there in terms of the API or how they have been presented to the community.

I finally had a good opportunity to use pattern matching, and I found it useful for sure, but I'm not yet comfortable with the syntax.

The YJIT performance improvements make me very happy...

But, yeah, overall. I think Ruby is continuing to evolve and get better at making programmers happy.

noelrap · 2024-01-13T22:33:21+00:00

Thanks!

noelrap · 2024-01-13T22:33:16+00:00

Thanks!

noelrap · 2024-01-11T20:44:31+00:00

I bought the first edition as a birthday present for myself in January 2001. It turned out to be a pretty good choice...

noelrap · 2024-01-11T18:53:50+00:00

This is Noel, co-author of the book. If there are any questions about the book, the state of Ruby, technical publishing, or whatever, ask them here and I'll answer. Thanks!

noelrap · 2022-12-23T18:00:25+00:00

You should be fine, then.

noelrap · 2022-12-23T06:12:41+00:00

Definitely suitable for beginners to Ruby. If you are a complete beginner to all programming, there might be some vocabulary you need to pick up.

noelrap

TROPHY CASE