TreeHouse Ruby Basics by Jason Seifer Course Review

Ruby Basics is the second course on the TreeHouse Rails Development track.  The Rails Development track takes around 30-40 hours when all is said and done.  Rails is short for Ruby on Rails, which is a scaffolded tool for developing web applications.  From what I can tell, working in Rails resembles coding in Ruby only in passing.  Rails work involves working on the command prompt, managing directory structure, and editing the individual components of your app.  People like Rails (again, from what I can tell) because one can really quickly assemble working apps without starting from scratch.  When you know what you are doing, things fall into place really quickly.

So, it stands to reason that some level of knowledge of Ruby is helpful when working on Rails.  I have read a lot of different opinions on this.  Some folks say you need no serious Ruby knowledge but most people suggest at least a passing knowledge will be helpful as you move forward with Rails Development.

Seifer's course is as basic as it comes.  You will go through basic commands, string, numbers, and do a brief introduction to methods.  The course is a bit different from Designing a website in that it features shorter videos and more interactive coding and quizzes.  When watching TreeHouse's make a website, it is not uncommon to find a 12 minute video.  Most of Seifer's are under 4 minutes.  He teaches you a skill, and then you practice it.  It has a really nice pace and you rarely experience that deep boredom that can come from watching videos that are too lengthy.

That said, keep in mind that this is Ruby Basics and it delivers on that.  It is good review for someone like me who just started studying Ruby a month ago, but if you have some level of knowledge about Ruby or any language really much of this is going to be excruciatingly boring.  I am almost a total newb and I found this pretty boring at times.  However, at the end of the day I think it is a wonderful tool for people just starting out.  Seifer does a nice job if explaining things and I think we can all use a basic refresher from time to time.  I ended up finishing this course really quickly, though I didn't time it, I finished this in probably under 2 hours.


Total hours into Programming: 83 (5 since last time )
Total Weeks Programming/Hours per week: 4/21

Progress on Gaddis' Starting out with Python: Done With Chapter 1, Appendix A,B
Progress on Shaw's Learning Ruby the Hard Way: Finished Exercise 1-13

My Text game: 3 hours, 118 lines

TreeHouse (1208 Points, 15 Badges)
TreeHouse Courses Finished:  Make a Website, Ruby Basics 

Code Academy Points: 640
Code Academy Badges: 68

Code Academy Skills Finished: 2 (Make a Website, Ruby)

Progress on Hartl's Tutorial Ready to start Chapter 3! 

Resources Finished:
Josh Kemp's No Degree, No Problem 8/14/2015

Chris Pine's Learn to Program 8/9/2015