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Ruby Plus: Another Ruby/Rails Screencast Site

By Peter Cooper / January 14, 2008

Ruby Plus is a site offering free Ruby and Rails related screencasts recorded by Bala Paranj, much in the same vein as Ryan Bates' Railscasts. The screencasts are generally similar in length and overall format to those from Railscasts. So far there are 29 episodes you can download.

The first twelve screencasts in the archive (for which you have to register to download, alas) were exclusively Ruby, covering topics like blocks, class_eval, modules, recursion, and so on, but unfortunately the rest of the screencasts have been entirely Rails focused beyond those first twelve. It's still a source worth checking for Ruby and Rails screencasts though, so give it a look.

(Update: Several people have reported to me that they have an issue with Ruby Plus being portrayed in a positive light. I'll admit I haven't watched a significant number of the screencasts, just a couple in fact, but what I saw seemed okay in terms of production. With all the complaints, however, I figure you should be aware that there appear to be quite a few people who are not keen on the site, so you may just want to skip this post.. but I cannot remove it as it is now part of the public record and, as you probably know, I don't do censorship.)

Comments

  1. Damien says:

    I just signed up but got this:

    "Due to high demand free accounts are not available. You need a paid account."

    Damien

  2. Mourner says:

    All this website is a stupid lie. Remember this name - Bala Paranj - not to ever deal with him. Ridiculous.

  3. Disgruntled says:

    Same as Damien above. Peter, you should check out the site and update this blog to NOT recommend the site/author unless they are upfront about charging for the screencasts. It appears that ALL of the screencasts require a signup.

  4. Jeremy says:

    He wants $47 a month now. Please remove this link, Peter. There are plenty of pay-for training sites out there.

    Or at least change it to warn readers and suggest Railscasts as a free, higher quality alternative.

  5. Jeremy says:

    He wants $47 a month now. Please remove this link, Peter. There are plenty of pay-for training sites out there.

    Or at least change it to warn readers and suggest Railscasts as a free, higher quality alternative.

  6. John Philip Green says:

    Bala and I have worked together and I've seen him present at a Ruby Meetup in SF. He's a lot of fun in real life... hope that translates into the screencasts.

  7. Peter Cooper says:

    This is the problem with scheduling a post a week in advance. I had this post scheduled back then as a filler post and postponed it due to all the good news we've had lately.. so my fact checking is a week old on this one. Sorry!

  8. John says:

    I was able to download the screencasts for free - never asked for $47

  9. Peter Cooper says:

    I've checked the site out again, and it still seems you can download all the recent screencasts for free. It also says sign up is free so I am trying that again also. Haven't got my validation mail yet though..

  10. addame says:

    I signed up last week and I can access all the 31 screencasts for free.
    I have been in the site few minutes ago and it's still working for me :-)

    Enjoy,

    addame

  11. Peter Cooper says:

    I'm guessing a change was made, then changed back again. In any case, the cake is a lie, but the screencasts don't appear to be, for now.

  12. sintaxi says:

    someone should direct them to a screencast on how to encrypt their users passwords

  13. ms says:

    Yeah, just tried the site and it requires payment. $47 a MONTH seems a bit ridiculous, especially for the limited content on the site.

  14. Peter Cooper says:

    Are people pulling my leg or something? I literally just went to the site a few minutes ago, signed up with all new details, and then downloaded a couple of episodes. All works fine, no $47 mentioned anywhere. What am I missing?

  15. Ryan Sandridge says:

    I haven't tried downloading or registering on this site, so I can't comment on that... but I noticed that several episodes appear to be screencasts covering chapters from Dave Thomas' Agile Web Development with Rails. I suppose it is possible he got permission to do so, but I find that a little sketchy.

  16. Jeremy says:

    As soon as I signed up it told me they were out of free accounts and I'd have to sign up for a paid account if I want access to the site content (click on "Sign Up" on the side, put in your details, and then the next page is "/checkout" with a Google Checkout button).

  17. zerohalo says:

    I signed up and downloaded screencasts for free. There was no mention of any paid accounts.

  18. bak says:

    The site itself is cargo-cultish. I emailed a bit with the author over the wisdom of emailing your new users plaintext passwords, and providing no functionality to change those passwords. His reply is that he uses Rick Olson's RESTful authentication plugin, (stores crypted pass in db) so all must be well.

  19. Markus says:

    I had no problem registering and viewing the Rails screen casts.

  20. Paul M. Watson says:

    Just tried and I download a variety of the casts without signing-up or paying anything. Tried a recent one and one from early Jan.

    It seems that if you go to the permalink it forces you to sign-up but if you click the download links from the main list it doesn't.

  21. Bala Paranj says:

    I got permission from Dave Thomas for the screencasts on AWDwR book. Regarding the $47 charge, it only happens to those who enter disposable email address during the signup process. Hope that clears the confusion.

    I am glad to watch any screencast that shows how to deal with mailing passwords. Password is encrypted and stored in the database. Mr bak : What is your suggestion? Constructive feedback is welcome.

    P.S: Don't worry my ego will not be hurt.

  22. Peter Cooper says:

    I think a lot of people would disagree with me, but pissing people off who put in fake e-mail addresses sounds like a fun idea to me ;-) It's really irritating when people do it here in their comments and I can't mail them back for whatever reason.

  23. Bala Paranj says:

    Top funky had suggested every developer should develop their own blog to learn about Rails. RubyPlus is an expression of my passion for Ruby and Rails.

    I am happy to be a cargo culter who solves real business problems that has business value.

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