anguz110 wrote:

Read my comment in the studio.

logiblocs wrote:

Getting started in Ruby

Ruby is a programming language that is quite fun and useful to learn. It is very dynamic, and is loosely typed. It is similar in these respects to python. It is object-oriented and has a very dynamic syntax that in many cases reads similar to English. It is used by a lot of projects and is gaining popularity, especially due to the popularity of the Ruby on Rails web framework.

Fear not if you didn't understand half of the last paragraph - we will cover it right from someone whose only programming experience is Scratch. It is a very good language for beginners because it teaches a lot of important things while still having a low learning curve. Experienced programmer will love meta programming (It's two words, or you can hyphenate) (yes that is a thing) and soon realize why ruby is becoming so popular.

Getting ruby

If you are on mac you're already sorted! Depending on your version and update of OSX you may have an old version - in this case it makes sense getting RVM. However, for the scope of this tutorial you should be fine with the pre-packaged version.

Windows users are probably best using Ruby Installer. You want to get the latest version (currently 2.0.0) although this tutorial will support 1.8.7+

If you are on Linux you have two options. The first is to use your package manager's version which, although fine for this tutorial, will probably be out of date. The other option is to use RVM (which I do) which is a bit more involved but you should be fine if you are comfortable with the shell. It has the benefit of allowing you to install multiple versions and will handle building from source for you.

What next?

We are going to start by showing you how to learn ruby in the console. Fire up a terminal (mac or windows) or click on the command prompt with Ruby (using rubyinstaller on windows). Now type “irb” and then enter. You should get something looking like this (on windows or mac):

]
username@fancycomputer ~ $ irb
1.9.3-p362 :001 > 

This is known as the Interactive Ruby prompt. The first bit is your version number - and the second a number which goes up by one each time you put in a line of code . You enter ruby code into the prompt and you will get an output depending on what you put in.

Lets try it out! Put in

puts "Hello, World!"

This will print out a strin
and press enter. You should get back something looking like this. I've put in annotations to help you understand:

1.9.3-p362 :001 > puts "Hello, World!"        <--- Your line of code
Hello, World!                                                    <--- The output from puts
 => nil                                                                <--- The evaluation (more on this later)
1.9.3-p362 :002 >                                           <--- Another prompt waiting for more code!

If you have done other programming you will notice two things - firstly there is no semicolon or brackets. You only need to provide brackets to stop ambiguity (more on that later) and its pretty obvious what you are saying. Semicolons are only required if you want to statements in the same line - otherwise just leave them out or people will laugh at you. You will also notice that the text that we want to be puts'd is in quotes - this tells ruby that it is a string (bit of text). Puts is a function that prints out text to the console.

So if you have a bit of background with programming you will know what this is - the classic Hello World. We will revisit the irb later when we talk about data types and expressions (don't worry - they are easy(ish) in ruby).

Saving and running ruby code

Fire up your favourite text editor. If you are just starting out notepad (Windows), textedit (Mac) or gedit or your desktop's equivelent (Linux) will be fine. If you are feeling hardcore use vi and if you are feeling semi-hardcore use nano if you are comfortable with how these work. Keep in mind that you will run into problems with notepad and textedit because of file extensions - I recommend going out and getting the demo of Sublime Text if you are serious about coding.

Ok, so you have the editor. Copy and paste, or better yet type, the following code into it.

puts "Hello, World!"

Save it as “helloworld.rb” to somewhere you know how to navigate to. As you guessed, its that same Hello World program from before. Now open up your terminal and cd to where you saved it. Then type “ruby helloworld.rb” and then enter. You should see this:

$ ruby helloworld.rb
Hello, World!
[/ruby]

[b]To conclude[/b]
So that's it for this week's tutorial. Hopefully you now know the basics of getting to the irb and runing simple programs. We will pick up where we left off next time, talking about the principles you need to know to write programs that do interesting and cool things. I apologise if you already have experience with programming or using the shell and this is a bit basic for you - don't worry we we will start to go into how the actual language works next week.


[/quote]
SPELLCHECK! I did a quick glance, I'll check more later. 

The Pragmatic Bookshelf | Metaprogramming Ruby

logiblocs wrote:

Sorry, I know this is going to be a pain to put in whatever interface we use. I'll do it and set up the formatting.

logiblocs wrote:

Sorry, I know this is going to be a pain to put in whatever interface we use. I'll do it and set up the formatting.

Also, @jk check the updated version for typo fixes.

logiblocs wrote:

Also, @Starscream what do you think of the updated interface? Is there anything else I can do?

logiblocs wrote:

Getting started in Ruby

Ruby is a programming language that is quite fun and useful to learn. It is very dynamic, and is loosely typed. It is similar in these respects to python. It is object-oriented and has a very dynamic syntax that in many cases reads similar to English. It is used by a lot of projects and is gaining popularity, especially due to the popularity of the Ruby on Rails web framework.

Fear not if you didn't understand half of the last paragraph - we will cover it right from someone whose only programming experience is Scratch. It is a very good language for beginners because it teaches a lot of important things while still having a low learning curve. Experienced programmer will love meta (Still didn't fix this one.)programming (yes that is a thing) and soon realize why ruby is becoming so popular.

Getting ruby

If you are on mac you're already sorted! (Sorry, my English teacher instincts are kicking in. The following sentence is kind of Redundant.)Depending on your version and update of OSX you may have an old version - in this case it makes sense getting RVM. (Maybe change to: If your version of OSX is old, then it makes sense getting {link here}. However, for the scope of this tutorial you should be fine with the pre-packaged version.

Windows users are probably best using Ruby Installer. You want to get the latest version (currently 2.0.0) although this tutorial will support 1.8.7+

If you are on (Capitalize it! Certain product name!) Linux you have two options. The first is to use your package manager's version which, although fine for this tutorial, will probably be out of date. The other option is to use RVM ((which isn't needed here!) I do) which is a bit more involved, but you should be fine if you are comfortable with the shell. It has the benefit of allowing you to install multiple versions and will handle building from source for you.

What next?

We are going to start by showing you how to learn ruby in the console. Fire up a terminal (mac or windows) or click on the command prompt with Ruby (using rubyinstaller on windows). Now type “irb” and then enter. You should get something looking like this (on windows or mac):
(I got to here, I'll finish in a second.)

username@fancycomputer ~ $ irb
1.9.3-p362 :001 > 

This is known as the Interactive Ruby prompt. The first bit is your version number - and the second a number which goes up by one each time you put in a line of code . You enter ruby code into the prompt and you will get an output depending on what you put in.

Lets try it out! Put in

puts "Hello, World!"

This will print out a strin
and press enter. You should get back something looking like this. I've put in annotations to help you understand:

1.9.3-p362 :001 > puts "Hello, World!"        <--- Your line of code
Hello, World!             <--- The output from puts
 => nil                            <--- The evaluation (more on this later)
1.9.3-p362 :002 >        <--- Another prompt waiting for more code!

If you have done other programming you will notice two things - firstly there is no semicolon or brackets. You only need to provide brackets to stop ambiguity (more on that later) and its pretty obvious what you are saying. Semicolons are only required if you want to statements in the same line - otherwise just leave them out or people will laugh at you. You will also notice that the text that we want to be puts'd is in quotes - this tells ruby that it is a string (bit of text). Puts is a function that prints out text to the console.

So if you have a bit of background with programming you will know what this is - the classic Hello World. We will revisit the irb later when we talk about data types and expressions (don't worry - they are easy(ish) in ruby).

Saving and running ruby code

Fire up your favourite text editor. If you are just starting out notepad (Windows), textedit (Mac) or gedit or your desktop's equivelent (Linux) will be fine. If you are feeling hardcore use vi and if you are feeling semi-hardcore use nano if you are comfortable with how these work. Keep in mind that you will run into problems with notepad and textedit because of file extensions - I recommend going out and getting the demo of Sublime Text if you are serious about coding.

Ok, so you have the editor. Copy and paste, or better yet type, the following code into it.

puts "Hello, World!"

Save it as “helloworld.rb” to somewhere you know how to navigate to. As you guessed, its that same Hello World program from before. Now open up your terminal and cd to where you saved it. Then type “ruby helloworld.rb” and then enter. You should see this:

$ ruby helloworld.rb
Hello, World!

To conclude
So that's it for this week's tutorial. Hopefully you now know the basics of getting to the irb and runing simple programs. We will pick up where we left off next time, talking about the principles you need to know to write programs that do interesting and cool things. I apologise if you already have experience with programming or using the shell and this is a bit basic for you - don't worry we we will start to go into how the actual language works next week.

StarscreamClone wrote:

logiblocs wrote:

Also, @Starscream what do you think of the updated interface? Is there anything else I can do?

I'd just make the logo bigger and completely stretch from inner border to inner border and have the page/issue number things below it. Other than that, I like it!

jkl0l wrote:

logiblocs wrote:

Getting started in Ruby

Ruby is a programming language that is quite fun and useful to learn. It is very dynamic, and is loosely typed. It is similar in these respects to python. It is object-oriented and has a very dynamic syntax that in many cases reads similar to English. It is used by a lot of projects and is gaining popularity, especially due to the popularity of the Ruby on Rails web framework.

Fear not if you didn't understand half of the last paragraph - we will cover it right from someone whose only programming experience is Scratch. It is a very good language for beginners because it teaches a lot of important things while still having a low learning curve. Experienced programmers will love metaprogramming (yes that is a thing) and soon realize why ruby is becoming so popular.

Getting ruby

If you are on mac you're already sorted! (Sorry, my English teacher instincts are kicking in. The following sentence is kind of Redundant.)Depending on your version of OSX you may have an old version of ruby- in this case it makes sense getting RVM. (Maybe change to: If your version of OSX is old, then it makes sense getting {link here} not really that simple technologically. I will rephrase better. However, for the scope of this tutorial you should be fine with the pre-packaged version.

Windows users are probably best using Ruby Installer. You want to get the latest version (currently 2.0.0) although this tutorial will support 1.8.7+

If you are on (Capitalize it! Certain product name!) sorry :( Linux you have two options. The first is to use your package manager's version which, although fine for this tutorial, will probably be out of date. The other option is to use RVM ((which isn't needed here!) I do) which is a bit more involved, but you should be fine if you are comfortable with the shell. It has the benefit of allowing you to install multiple versions and will handle building from source for you.

What next?

We are going to start by showing you how to learn ruby in the console. Fire up a terminal (mac or windows) or click on the command prompt with Ruby (using rubyinstaller on windows). Now type “irb” and then enter. You should get something looking like this (on windows or mac):
(I got to here, I'll finish in a second.)

username@fancycomputer ~ $ irb
1.9.3-p362 :001 > 

This is known as the Interactive Ruby prompt. The first bit is your version number - and the second a number which goes up by one each time you put in a line of code . You enter ruby code into the prompt and you will get an output depending on what you put in.

Lets try it out! Type in:

puts "Hello, World!"

This will print out a strin
and press enter. You should get back something looking like this. I've put in annotations to help you understand:

1.9.3-p362 :001 > puts "Hello, World!"        <--- Your line of code
Hello, World!             <--- The output from puts
 => nil                            <--- The evaluation (more on this later)
1.9.3-p362 :002 >        <--- Another prompt waiting for more code!

If you have done other programming you will notice two things - firstly there are no semicolon or brackets. You only need to provide brackets to stop ambiguity (more on that later) and its pretty obvious what you are saying. Semicolons are only required if you want to statements in the same line - otherwise just leave them out or people will laugh at you. You will also notice that the text that we want is in quotes - this tells ruby that it is a string (bit of text). Puts is a function that prints out text to the console.

So if you have a bit of background with programming you will know what this is - the classic Hello World. We will revisit the irb later when we talk about data types and expressions.

Saving and running ruby code

Fire up your favourite text editor. If you are just starting out notepad (Windows), textedit (Mac) or gedit/your desktop's equivelent (Linux) will be fine. Keep in mind that you will run into problems with notepad and textedit because of file extensions - I recommend going out and getting the demo of Sublime Text if you want a good editor.

Ok, so you have the editor. Copy and paste, or better yet type, the following code into it.

puts "Hello, World!"

Save it as “helloworld.rb” to somewhere you know how to navigate to. As you guessed, its that same Hello World program from before. Now open up your terminal and cd to where you saved it. Then type “ruby helloworld.rb” and then enter. You should see this:

$ ruby helloworld.rb
Hello, World!

To conclude
So that's it for this week's tutorial. Hopefully you now know the basics of getting to the irb and runing simple programs. We will pick up where we left off next time, talking about the principles you need to know to write programs that do interesting and cool things. I apologise if you already have experience with programming or using the shell and this is a bit basic for you - don't worry we we will start to go into how the actual language works next week.

Lythium wrote:

I made an icon:

cheeseeater wrote:

When will we publish our first issue?

logiblocs wrote:

jkl0l wrote:

logiblocs wrote:

Getting started in Ruby

Ruby is a programming language that is quite fun and useful to learn. It is very dynamic, and is loosely typed. It is similar in these respects to python. It is object-oriented and has a very dynamic syntax that in many cases reads similar to English. It is used by a lot of projects and is gaining popularity, especially due to the popularity of the Ruby on Rails web framework.

Fear not if you didn't understand half of the last paragraph - we will cover it right from someone whose only programming experience is Scratch. It is a very good language for beginners because it teaches a lot of important things while still having a low learning curve. Experienced programmers will love metaprogramming (yes, that is a thing) and soon realize why ruby is becoming so popular.

Getting ruby

If you are on mac you're already sorted! (Sorry, my English teacher instincts are kicking in. The following sentence is kind of Redundant.)Depending on your version of OSX you may have an old version of ruby- in this case it makes sense getting RVM. (Maybe change to: If your version of OSX is old, then it makes sense getting {link here} not really that simple technologically. I will rephrase better. (xD Sorry, Now that I read it, it is simple. xD I was half asleep. However, for the scope of this tutorial you should be fine with the pre-packaged version.

Windows users are probably best using Ruby Installer. You want to get the latest version (currently 2.0.0) although this tutorial will support 1.8.7+

If you are on (Capitalize it! Certain product name!) sorry :( Linux you have two options. The first is to use your package manager's version which, although fine for this tutorial, will probably be out of date. The other option is to use RVM ((which isn't needed here!) I do) which is a bit more involved, but you should be fine if you are comfortable with the shell. It has the benefit of allowing you to install multiple versions and will handle building from source for you.

What next?

We are going to start by showing you how to learn ruby in the console. Fire up a terminal (mac or windows) or click on the command prompt with Ruby (using rubyinstaller on windows). Now type “irb” and then enter. You should get something looking like this (on windows or mac):
(I got to here, I'll finish in a second.)

username@fancycomputer ~ $ irb
1.9.3-p362 :001 > 

This is known as the Interactive Ruby prompt. The first bit is your version number - and the second a number which goes up by one each time you put in a line of code . You enter ruby code into the prompt and you will get an output depending on what you put in.

Lets try it out! Type in:

puts "Hello, World!"

This will print out a string
and press enter. You should get back something looking like this. I've put in annotations to help you understand:

1.9.3-p362 :001 > puts "Hello, World!"        <--- Your line of code
Hello, World!             <--- The output from puts
 => nil                            <--- The evaluation (more on this later)
1.9.3-p362 :002 >        <--- Another prompt waiting for more code!

If you have done other programming you will notice two things - firstly there are no semicolon or brackets. You only need to provide brackets to stop ambiguity (more on that later) and its pretty obvious what you are saying. Semicolons are only required if you want to statements in the same line - otherwise just leave them out or people will laugh at you. You will also notice that the text that we want is in quotes - this tells ruby that it is a string (bit of text). Puts is a function that prints out text to the console.

So if you have a bit of background with programming you will know what this is - the classic Hello World. We will revisit the irb later when we talk about data types and expressions.

Saving and running ruby code

Fire up your favourite text editor. If you are just starting out notepad (Windows), textedit (Mac) or gedit/your desktop's equivelent (Linux) will be fine. Keep in mind that you will run into problems with notepad and textedit because of file extensions - I recommend going out and getting the demo of Sublime Text if you want a good editor.

Ok, so you have the editor. Copy and paste, or better yet type, the following code into it.

puts "Hello, World!"

Save it as “helloworld.rb” to somewhere you know how to navigate to. As you guessed, its that same Hello World program from before. Now open up your terminal and cd to where you saved it. Then type “ruby helloworld.rb” and then enter. You should see this:

$ ruby helloworld.rb
Hello, World!

To conclude
So that's it for this week's tutorial. Hopefully you now know the basics of getting to the irb and running simple programs. We will pick up where we left off next time, talking about the principles you need to know to write programs that do interesting and cool things. I apologize if you already have experience with programming or using the shell and this is a bit basic for you - don't worry we we will start to go into how the actual language works next week.

Bit of self-editing. More to do. That sentence is kinda redundant but it is not as simple as your idea. Will fix tomorrow. (Sorry for the lack of personal pronouns and verbs in these sentences)

spaceyJC wrote:

This is really awesome! I love looking at all the Scratchpapers out there. I have a Scratchpaper (as you can see by my signature) and it is really fun to do! Maybe we could help eachother out…? I don't know, but I find this pretty awesome!

cobraguy wrote:

I have an idea. (I know I'm not part of the paper so you don't have to listen to this suggestion) How about a section where you interview a Scratcher? I know it may not be really be about technology, but I just thought it would be a fun thing to see in the paper each issue.