Rails for Zombies: An Online Rails Learning Environment
Rails for Zombies is an intriguing attempt to teach people how to use Ruby on Rails directly in the Web browser. It comes from Envy Labs (and specifically Gregg Pollack, once of RailsEnvy fame).
The goal of Rails for Zombies is to make the learning process immediately accessible and fun. You're guaranteed to learn quite a bit too as the in-browser development environment frequently tests you and makes you actually do stuff rather than merely read learning material.
As Gregg points out, what you learn through R4Z won't be quite enough for you to build your own version of Twitter (or even Twitter for zombies - arf arf) but it covers enough of the basics to put you in a better position to continue with more traditional learning techniques later.
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November 19, 2010 at 3:48 am
"Once of RailsEnvy fame".. heh.. My time in the limelight has past.. Might as well shrivel up and die. ;-)
But truly thanks for mentioning Zombies. There's much more talent behind this venture aside from me. Eric Allam is the brains behind 99% of the programming, Jason VanLue & Nick Walsh make a killer graphic design team, and the rest of the Envy Labs team really helped make it great experience for the Rails beginner.
November 19, 2010 at 3:38 pm
2 points:
1)
i still become lazy to fill up the sign up forms.
i miss a fast sign up with a GitHub / Facebook / Twitter account.
2)
i dont like register first, then you get content sites.
why this site is not like this: i can use it as a start without registration, and then if i like to save my work or more, then i can register for it.
November 19, 2010 at 8:18 pm
This is a great website! It makes me hungry for learning more about rails! Keep up the good work!
November 19, 2010 at 8:30 pm
@Gregg: Haha, I meant more that you're not famous for RailsEnvy in the sense that it doesn't exist anymore, but it's something I suspect most Rubyists can remember. Perhaps Ruby5 would have made a better touchstone there ;-)
November 20, 2010 at 12:45 am
nice page :-)
i miss a small cheat sheet, if it is not possible to solve a problem.
the cheat sheet can be deep links to the rails docu - so the student is pointed to use the original docu for his problem...
November 20, 2010 at 10:37 pm
I'm not particularly interested in Rails at the moment but Rails for Zombies really makes me want to move onto the next lab. Great job Gregg and the whole team involved on this, also thanks for putting everything available for download.