Ruby in a Nutshell

by Yukihiro Matsumoto

Book Overview

Ruby is an absolutely pure object-oriented scripting language written in C and designed with Perl and Python capabilities in mind. While its roots are in Japan, Ruby is slowly but surely gaining ground in the US. The goal of Yukihiro Matsumoto, creator of Ruby and author of this book, is to incorporate the strengths of languages like Perl, Python, Lisp and Smalltalk. Ruby is a genuine attempt to combine the best of everything in the scripting world...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0596002149
• ISBN13: 9780596002145
• Release Date: December 2001
• Publisher: O'Reilly Media
• Length: 218 Pages
• Weight: 1.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 6.2" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

An Excellent At-Your-Fingers Quick Reference

There isn't much in-depth knowledge I can impart based on this book. It fulfills its demanded function as "A Desktop Quick Reference". It provides a quick reference to the core language features and APIs in a succinct way. On the fly, this book is a great reference. If you are going to be carrying around a reference for Ruby, this should be it. Its small size does not deter it from being full of succinct information. Do not buy this if you are looking for a tutorial-style introduction to Ruby. (In that case, see Programming Ruby by Dave Thomas). If you are looking for a quick reference to this fun programming language, however, this book is a great choice!

Ruby In A Nutshell

This book is very much a brief reference for Ruby -- it is consistent with the general philosophy of the nutshell series. Don't expect to learn ruby from this book even if you are already an experienced programmer. It is strictly a reference for those who need a quick reminder of the syntax. Coverage of semantics is very limited and examples are few and far between.

Slightly dated (1st printing) but good "quick" reference.

Forgotten the name of the libarary that does directory listings? Need to know the method of the IMAP libarary? This is the book for that. Full documentation, look elsewhere, but as a handy guide to keep on your desk. Not a beginners learn to code Ruby book, but a beginners and intermediates quick look up the method book. Learning Ruby? Get this _AND_ a beginner tutorial book. It will speed up your learning curve.

Still a great reference to keep by your side

The book I have (2002 copyright) is based on Ruby 1.6.5. I have Ruby version 1.8.1-11. So the book is missing certain improvements to this elegant object oriented language. But that didn't seem to be a problem for me when using the book while learning the language.I keep this book by my side when programming Ruby because, like most O'Reilly Cookbooks, the answers to the basics are a quick flip of the pages away. I also use The Ruby Way which is also good in a text book kind of way -- it offers examples.All the basic functions and Classes are documented in this Cookbook. Its as if the originator of the language, the author Yukihiro Matsumoto, squeezed all the fluff out of the documentation and only served up the critical calling conventions for all important statements, functions and Classes.For updates on the functions you can also use online resources or the Help file that comes with the program itself.This review was written in February of 2004 and version 2.0 of Ruby is said to be a complete re-write. But that release will not be out for another year or so. I would then guess that this book would be valid through 2005.John DunbarSugar Land, TX

Book does a good job as a reference

I'm just starting to learn the Ruby language, and come into it with a background of having used about 20-25 other languages (to some extent). If you are brand new to Ruby and want to learn it, then the book "Programming Ruby: The Pragmatic Programmer's Guide" is probably a better place to start than this book.But once you have an understanding of the basic ideas of Ruby, then you're going to want a reference of all the standard Ruby "objects", and what methods are supported by each class of objects. "Ruby in a Nutshell" calls itself "a desktop quick reference", and I think it does a good job of it. It covers a lot of ground, and tries to do it in as few words as necessary.As to the language itself, I'd say that programmers familiar with Java or Objective-C would find Ruby an easy language to pick up, and to use for projects you might otherwise use Perl for. I haven't tried to use Python yet, so I can not compare Ruby to that language.