I am looking for a good Ruby teaching guide (in pretty much any form) that gives a good sense of what is needed for programming with the Rails framework.

closed as off-topic by Martijn Pieters Jan 11 '17 at 14:29




I took up Rails with the Agile Web Development with Rails 2nd Edition. I have their latest (4th) edition and recommend it, but there are lots of other resources out there now.

One in particular that I would very much recommend is the free Ruby on Rails Tutorial by Michael Hartl. It's up to date and teaches you how to use not only Ruby and Rails, but also other modern and important tools such as RVM for Ruby/gem management, Git for version control and RSpec for testing. It encourages a great test-driven workflow, so I'd recommend it even if you're not a beginner. I actually used this tutorial a few months back to refresh my memory and get into the new Rails 3 after having been out of it for over a year.

After you're comfortable with the Rails framework, then you should learn the Ruby language it is built upon. This is the stage I am at. Some of the books I'd recommend for learning Ruby are:

  • Eloquent Ruby - teaches you the Ruby way in many chapters covering a wide spectrum of the Ruby language. Great read for polishing and enforcing your Ruby knowledge, and also great to re-read just to reinforce everything!
  • The Ruby Programming Language - co-authored by the author of Ruby himself, Yukihiro Matsumoto...need I say more? This is quite in-depth so not great for beginning to learn the language but great for helping you to master it.
  • The Well Grounded Rubyist - currently going through this book. It is well written and covers a lot of ground, good for getting the hang of Ruby, but probably assumes you're not a programming newbie.

Obviously this is based on my experience and recommendations I have received from friends and colleagues, so I'm not saying this is the path for everyone interested in Ruby/Rails, but so far it's working for me. I'll be interested in seeing what resources others recommend here.


Rails for Zombies is a Code School course that teaches you the basics of Rails.
Link: RailsForZombies.org
It is recomended that you first complete the activity at TryRuby.org
Good Luck!


You can try the Programming Ruby book by Pragmatic bookshelf. And follow that up with Agile development with Rails book. Both are excellent books.


What really helped me to learn Ruby on Rails was to learn the same thing from a variety of different teachers. Instead of simply moving on after completing one book I purchased 7 and went through each one in order to make sure that all the concepts really got stuck in my head. I also went through the One Month Rails, Code School and Team Treehouse

After this I began watching AirPair Videos to see what other students were learning.

hope this helps.
