LearningRails: Create and Deploy a Web Application in Two Days

Following the success of their inaugural seminar, a new offering of the 2-day LearningRails seminar will be held in San Francisco on April 29-30, 2008. Michael Slater and Christopher Haupt, both former Adobe engineers, have aimed their Ruby on Rails Seminar for web developers, designers and programmers to anyone who has some PHP or .Net experience.

Combining lecture, hands-on labs, and personal attention, the LearningRails Seminar reduces the complications of web development by teaching students from a prepared application, using a step-by-step approach to create and deploy a complete web application.

"To learn to use a highly capable framework like Rails on your own, you can spend months learning it from the bottom up. We help people get up and running quickly by focusing on just what they need to know first, and providing them with proven code to work from," Michael said. "People leave the seminar with a fully-launched web-app that they can develop incrementally." Participants also receive a complete set of software, tools, and documentation on a Flash drive, containing all the code for the application they have built in class, and a hosting environment they can use after the course has ended.

The LearningRails seminar focuses on the core principles for creating an effective web application: views, models, and controllers, as well as basic principles of Ruby and application development in general. Participants will work with Ajax, ActiveRecord, RESTful design, Subversion, and Capistrano during the two-day event.

The inaugural seminar held in February established the validity of this model of learning. As one participant, Chris Madden, shared, "The Seminar was just what I needed. It provided me with the overall knowledge of Rails, Ruby, and deployment that I didn't find in most of the tutorial books that I had completed beforehand."

Details and registration for the seminar can be found at BuildingWebApps.com/seminar.

Slater and Haupt have also launched a Free On-Line Course which includes podcasts and screen shots, and serves as a basic introduction to learning Ruby on Rails.

BuildingWebApps.com is an information portal for web application developers providing a valuable resource for the Ruby on Rails community. The company is focused on the Ruby on Rails platform and also covers related subjects, such as servers, user interfaces and related business issues.

Michael Slater and Christopher Haupt are available to discuss anything related to Ruby on Rails and web application development. Contact michael @ buildingwebapps.com, or call (888) 670-6793 ext. 702.

Source: PRWeb

What is Ruby?

Ruby is a reflective, object-oriented programming language. It combines syntax inspired by Ada and Perl with Smalltalk-like object-oriented features, and also shares some features with Python, Lisp, Dylan and CLU. Ruby is a single-pass interpreted language. Its main implementation is Free software distributed under an open-source license.

History
The language was created by Yukihiro "Matz" Matsumoto, who started working on Ruby on February 24, 1993 and released it to the public in 1995.

"Ruby" was named after a colleague's birthstone, and in Japanese, is also the word for phonetic glosses of Sino-derived characters. Appropriately, though not intentionally, the name reflects the language's Perl heritage. Pearl is the birthstone of June while the ruby is the birthstone of July (suggesting progression). Although Matsumoto was not aware of it at the time, in typography, pearl and ruby are descriptors in a deprecated hierarchy for type size.

As of December 2005, the latest stable version is 1.8.4. Ruby 1.9 (with some major changes) is also in development.

Philosophy
Matz's primary design consideration is to make programmers happy by reducing the menial work they must do, following the principles of good user interface design. He stresses that systems design needs to emphasize human, rather than computer, needs:

Often people, especially computer engineers, focus on the machines. They think, "By doing this, the machine will run faster. By doing this, the machine will run more effectively. By doing this, the machine will something something something." They are focusing on machines. But in fact we need to focus on humans, on how humans care about doing programming or operating the application of the machines. We are the masters. They are the slaves.

Ruby is said to follow the principle of least surprise (POLS), meaning that the language typically behaves intuitively or as the programmer assumes it should. The phrase did not originate with Matz and, generally speaking, Ruby may more closely follow a paradigm best termed as "Matz's Least Surprise", though many programmers have found it to be close to their own mental model as well.

Semantics
Ruby is object-oriented: every bit of data is an object, even classes and types many other languages designate primitive such as integers. Every function is a method. Named values (variables) always designate references to objects, not the objects themselves. Ruby supports inheritance with dynamic dispatch, mixins and singleton methods (belonging to, and defined for, a single instance rather than being defined on the class). Though Ruby does not support multiple inheritance, classes can import modules as mixins. Procedural syntax is supported, but everything done in Ruby procedurally (that is, outside of the scope of a particular object) is actually done to an Object instance named 'main'. Since this class is parent to every other class, the changes become visible to all classes and objects.

Ruby has been described as a multi-paradigm programming language: it allows you to program procedurally (defining functions/variables outside classes makes them part of the root, 'self' Object), with object orientation (everything is an object) or functionally (it has anonymous functions, closures, and continuations; statements all have values, and functions return the last evaluation). It has support for introspection, reflection and meta-programming, as well as support for threads. Ruby features dynamic typing, and supports parametric polymorphism as a matter of course.

According to the Ruby FAQ, "If you like Perl, you will like Ruby and be right at home with its syntax. If you like Smalltalk, you will like Ruby and be right at home with its semantics. If you like Python, you may or may not be put off by the huge difference in design philosophy between Python and Ruby/Perl."

Features

• multi-threading on all platforms
• DLL/shared library dynamic loading on most platforms.
• introspection, reflection and meta-programming
• large standard library
• supports dependency injection
• continuations and generators (examples in RubyGarden: continuations and generators)

Ruby currently lacks full support for Unicode, though it has partial support for UTF-8.

About this Terminology
This terminology is from The Wikipedia which is published under the GNU Free Documentation License.

NetBeans 6.0 Integrated Development Environment Ready for Action

Sun Microsystems, Inc. (NASDAQ:JAVA) and the NetBeans community today announced the availability of the award-winning NetBeans(TM) 6.0 Integrated Development Environment (IDE). NetBeans 6.0 IDE extends support beyond Java(TM) by providing a rich set of features for C/C++, JavaScript(TM) and the Ruby language, including Ruby on Rails - further enhancing developer productivity with multiple languages and ease of use.

“The release of 6.0 is the culmination of NetBeans momentum in the IDE marketplace," said Jeet Kaul, vice president of Developer Products and Programs at Sun. “While innovation drives interest and excitement in the developer community, collaboration with and use by key industry players drives adoption. And we are happy to have Ikivo AB, JasperSoft Corporation, Nokia Corporation and Wipro Technologies working with the NetBeans community."

The NetBeans 6.0 release marks a monumental milestone, with the following highlights:

• Enhanced code editor with smarter code completion, occurrence highlighting, in place renaming and improved navigation and inspection
• Next generation Swing GUI Builder (formerly known as Project Matisse) with Swing Application Framework and Beans Binding technology
• Improved visual tools for developing web applications, web services, mobile applications and UML models
• Extensive edit/refactor/debug test/deploy functionality for Ruby and Ruby on Rails development
• New file navigation functionality for C/C++ developers with improved debugger integration
• Comprehensive support for Java Platform Enterprise Edition 5 development

NetBeans 6.0 features previously available from add-on packs such as the Visual Web and Enterprise Packs, have been integrated into NetBeans and are delivered via a single install program. This new install program allows for easy customization and installation. In conjunction with the NetBeans release, Sun Java(TM) Studio Enterprise and Sun Java(TM) Studio Creator have launched migration programs to enable their users to migrate to NetBeans and use the functionality that has been incorporated there.

"As the largest and longest running mobile developer community with more than 3.4 million members, Forum Nokia is continually focused on highlighting best-of-breed productivity tools for our developer community. We are glad to endorse NetBeans 6.0 as a MIDP2 productivity tool that enables developers to bring out the best features of JSR-248 on Nokia devices and thereby addressing several hundred million Nokia device owners," said Lee Epting, vice president, Forum Nokia, Nokia Corporation.

Sun also offers a tiered set of developer support services for its software offerings, ranging from single incident to comprehensive developer plans. In addition, with a broad portfolio of training and certification offerings, developers can enhance their skill sets to take advantage of cutting-edge technologies. To learn more, visit: http://www.netbeans.org/kb/support.html.

The NetBeans Partner Program recognizes the strength that partners bring to the overall NetBeans value proposition as well as the value in reaching one of the largest and pre-eminent communities of software developers in the world.

“We are very excited to engage on a strategic level with Sun and the NetBeans community to help bring advanced rich media content to NetBeans mobility developers specifically and the Java community in general,” said Magnus Zetterberg, vice president of Business Development, Ikivo. “The NetBeans development community can now fully employ the power of Scalable Vector Graphics to facilitate the creation of standards based rich media content on the Java ME platform.”

"As the market leader in open source business intelligence, we recognize the value of the open source NetBeans community," said Jose Morales, vice president of Business Development, JasperSoft. "Our participation with the collaborative NetBeans community is complementary to both NetBeans and JasperSoft technology. By providing iReport as a native NetBeans plugin, developers from the NetBeans community can now enjoy the benefits of developing Java applications with built-in business intelligence."

Wipro Technologies, the leading global provider of integrated business, technology and process solutions on a global delivery platform, has recently joined the NetBeans Strategic Partner Program. "As a global service delivery provider, one of our primary endeavours is to empower our developers to be productive. We see the new NetBeans 6.0 release as a key enabler of increasing our developer productivity. Now as a NetBeans Strategic Partner, we are well positioned to not just leverage the vastly improved and new and innovative features of NetBeans 6.0, but also work with the NetBeans community to contribute and channel our expertise in the developer community as a whole," said Rajesh Ram Mishra, vice president and chief technology officer, Telecom and Product Engineering Solutions, Wipro Technologies.

Developers making the switch to NetBeans

The NetBeans community has experienced tremendous growth, to date there have been more than 16 million downloads and a 300 percent increase in email list subscribers during the past three years. Many developers are migrating to NetBeans from other IDEs. To read about their stories, visit: http://www.netbeans.org/switch/realstories.html

Kaul continues, “Developers are the heart and soul of the IT industry. At Sun we are committed to Free and Open Source software, and it gives me great pleasure to say that NetBeans.org is part of Sun's multi-year sponsorship of a developer program called the Open Source Community Innovation Awards. We believe the program will promote creativity from individuals and teams, and recognize the contributions from some of the brightest minds in the industry.”

Open Source Community Innovation Awards Program

NetBeans community has also been selected as part of Sun’s Open Source Community Innovation Awards Program. Announced last week, the multi-year program is designed to foster innovation and recognize some of the more active open source communities within Sun. Six communities have been selected for the program’s first year: GlassFish(TM), NetBeans, OpenJDK(TM), OpenOffice.org, OpenSolaris(TM) and OpenSPARC(TM). Prizes are expected to total at least $1 million (USD) a year.

Beginning January 2008, the six open source communities will announce the details around the individual programs. Each community will have its own rules and judging criteria. Prize winners will be announced in August 2008. To follow contest updates and major developments, visit: http://www.sun.com/opensource/awards

About Sun Microsystems, Inc.

A singular vision -- "The Network Is The Computer"(TM) -- guides Sun in the development of technologies that power the world's most important markets. Sun's philosophy of sharing innovation and building communities is at the forefront of the next wave of computing: the Participation Age. Sun can be found in more than one-hundred countries and on the Web at sun.com.

Sun, Sun Microsystems, the Sun logo, Solaris, Java, JavaScript, OpenSolaris, NetBeans, GlassFish, OpenJDK and The Network Is The Computer are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sun Microsystems, Inc. in the United States and other countries. All SPARC trademarks are used under license and are trademarks or registered trademarks of SPARC International, Inc. in the United States and other countries. Products bearing SPARC trademarks are based upon an architecture developed by Sun Microsystems, Inc.

Source: PRWeb

lynda.com Announces Release of Ruby on Rails Beyond the Basics

lynda.com, the leader in self-paced digital media and design training, today introduced Ruby on Rails Beyond the Basics.

In this sequel to the popular Ruby on Rails Essential Training, expert instructor Kevin Skoglund teaches comprehensive techniques for web developers who already feel comfortable with the fundamentals of Ruby and the Rails MVC framework. This training will help developers move toward creating full-featured Ruby on Rails applications. Kevin begins by explaining how to update software and projects to the latest versions. He then demonstrates alternative ways to interact with Ruby and your Rails applications and teaches the intermediate aspects of the Ruby language. Kevin provides step-by-step instructions for creating a custom blog and content management application. He uses this practical example to show how to work with database migrations, how to get more from ActiveRecord and avoid common pitfalls, how to create flexible controllers and views, and how to improve performance, security, and code management. Exercise files accompany the tutorials.

"This is the perfect resource for anyone developing a real website in Ruby on Rails," says Lynda Weinman, CEO of lynda.com. "It covers not only in-depth programming concepts, but also the 'care and feeding' tips you'll need to efficiently maintain your Ruby on Rails development and production environments."

Anyone with an internet connection can access Ruby on Rails Beyond the Basics by subscribing to lynda.com's Online Training Library®. A separate CD-ROM version of Ruby on Rails Beyond the Basics is planned later this month.

Subscriptions to the lynda.com Online Training Library® start at $25 a month, and provide access to over 22,000 movie tutorials covering more than 320 technology career tools, software applications, and techniques. Subscribers can access any of the computer-based training courses at their convenience. Multi-user subscriptions are also available for companies and institutions seeking to provide education and training to groups.

For free online samples of Ruby on Rails Beyond the Basics and more detailed product information, please visit http://movielibrary.lynda.com/html/modPage.asp?ID=395

To arrange to view the full training title, please contact megan@lynda.com.

For more information on lynda.com products, please visit http://www.lynda.com/ or call 1-888-335-9632.

About lynda.com
Since 1997, lynda.com has provided education and technical training solutions for designers, computer graphics specialists, digital media users, and computer owners. lynda.com products include web-based training, instructional books, CD- and DVD-based video training, self-paced online learning, and events for creative designers, instructors, students, and hobbyists. lynda.com specializes in teaching fundamental design and graphics principles along with the latest computer software, digital media technologies, and techniques.

About Kevin Skoglund
Kevin Skoglund is the owner of Pixel & Press (http://www.pixelandpress.com/) , a web development company specializing in application development using Ruby on Rails, PHP, SQL, HTML, and CSS. Pixel & Press web clients include lynda.com, Flashforward, An Event Apart, Google, The American Institute of Architects (AIA) New York, and Aidan Bradley Photography. Kevin began creating websites in 2001. He has been using PHP and MySQL to develop web applications since 2003, and started using Ruby on Rails in 2005. He also maintains a blog for web developers at http://www.nullislove.com/

Source: PRWeb

Forget Paris in April, Think Atlanta in November for Ruby on Rails Bootcamp, November 12-16, 2007

To meet the rising demand for quality Ruby on Rails training, Big Nerd Ranch, Inc., premier provider of week-long, intensive training classes for web developers, system administrators and programmers, announced the fall dates for Ruby on Rails Bootcamp (http://bignerdranch.com/classes/ruby.shtml) for November 12-16, 2007. The five-day class features Ruby on Rails guru, Charles Brian Quinn (http://bignerdranch.com/instructors/quinn.shtml), and is designed specifically for developers, web designers and project managers charged with the development of robust, efficient and stable database-driven web applications. Students attending this class are not just paying for a simple overview of an over-hyped equivalent of programming bling. Instead, they are thrust head-first into a rigorous study of one of the most elegant and powerful languages and frameworks available to the serious web developer.

Tapping his extensive experience as a full-time Ruby on Rails developer, Charles Brian Quinn presents information within a real-world context, where the introduction of concepts is followed by examples of how those concepts are utilized. In addition, attendees of the class are encouraged to bring their own projects to the class to receive individualized guidance.

"One of the greatest benefits to Ruby on Rails Bootcamp is also one of the more fluid and intangible aspects of the Big Nerd Ranch learning environment," commented Charles Brian Quinn, class instructor. "So much of the learning process occurs after class is over, during the evenings in the lab. That is when students come together for post-class brain dumps, code show-offs and assistance in helping architect their next big application. It is during those late night sessions when many students get their big 'ah ha!' moment."

At the end of the five-day Ruby on Rails training class, students will leave fully schooled in the key elements of Ruby on Rails development, including:

• Understanding Rails major components: Active Record, ActionPack, ActionMailer and ActiveSupport
• Understanding Ruby on Rails conventions and the Model View Controller
• Being able to install, setup, design, develop and deploy Ruby on Rails applications using Capistrano and update and maintain existing Ruby on Rails applications
• Building, parsing and manipulating XML Documents by generating RSS feeds and creating and consuming Web Services
• Making sophisticated and dynamic user interfaces utilizing AJAX and using Ruby libraries, plug-ins and generators to enhance extensibility of functionality

No previous experience with Ruby or Rails is required, however, students attending the class should be familiar with basic programming principles such as if/else, methods, objects and data.

The Big Nerd Ranch incorporates intensive training classes for Unix and Mac OS X programmers and system administrators in a retreat setting outside Atlanta, GA. Class price of $3500 includes lodging, all meals, original instruction materials, 24-hour lab access and ground transportation to and from the Atlanta airport. Students are encouraged to bring independent projects to class, allowing for input from classmates and individual instructor attention. For more information, call 678-595-6773 or visit www.bignerdranch.com.

Source: PRWeb

Forget Paris in April, Think Atlanta in November for Ruby on Rails Bootcamp, November 12-16, 2007

To meet the rising demand for quality Ruby on Rails training, Big Nerd Ranch, Inc., premier provider of week-long, intensive training classes for web developers, system administrators and programmers, announced the fall dates for Ruby on Rails Bootcamp (http://bignerdranch.com/classes/ruby.shtml) for November 12-16, 2007. The five-day class features Ruby on Rails guru, Charles Brian Quinn (http://bignerdranch.com/instructors/quinn.shtml), and is designed specifically for developers, web designers and project managers charged with the development of robust, efficient and stable database-driven web applications. Students attending this class are not just paying for a simple overview of an over-hyped equivalent of programming bling. Instead, they are thrust head-first into a rigorous study of one of the most elegant and powerful languages and frameworks available to the serious web developer.

Tapping his extensive experience as a full-time Ruby on Rails developer, Charles Brian Quinn presents information within a real-world context, where the introduction of concepts is followed by examples of how those concepts are utilized. In addition, attendees of the class are encouraged to bring their own projects to the class to receive individualized guidance.

"One of the greatest benefits to Ruby on Rails Bootcamp is also one of the more fluid and intangible aspects of the Big Nerd Ranch learning environment," commented Charles Brian Quinn, class instructor. "So much of the learning process occurs after class is over, during the evenings in the lab. That is when students come together for post-class brain dumps, code show-offs and assistance in helping architect their next big application. It is during those late night sessions when many students get their big 'ah ha!' moment."

At the end of the five-day Ruby on Rails training class, students will leave fully schooled in the key elements of Ruby on Rails development, including:

• Understanding Rails major components: Active Record, ActionPack, ActionMailer and ActiveSupport
• Understanding Ruby on Rails conventions and the Model View Controller
• Being able to install, setup, design, develop and deploy Ruby on Rails applications using Capistrano and update and maintain existing Ruby on Rails applications
• Building, parsing and manipulating XML Documents by generating RSS feeds and creating and consuming Web Services
• Making sophisticated and dynamic user interfaces utilizing AJAX and using Ruby libraries, plug-ins and generators to enhance extensibility of functionality

No previous experience with Ruby or Rails is required, however, students attending the class should be familiar with basic programming principles such as if/else, methods, objects and data.

The Big Nerd Ranch incorporates intensive training classes for Unix and Mac OS X programmers and system administrators in a retreat setting outside Atlanta, GA. Class price of $3500 includes lodging, all meals, original instruction materials, 24-hour lab access and ground transportation to and from the Atlanta airport. Students are encouraged to bring independent projects to class, allowing for input from classmates and individual instructor attention. For more information, call 678-595-6773 or visit www.bignerdranch.com.

Source: PRWeb

ActiveState Releases Advanced IDE for Ruby on Rails Award-winning professional IDE for web application development available now

ActiveState, the leading provider of tools and services for dynamic languages, released the latest version of Komodo IDE today at RailsConf 2007, introducing unparalleled Ruby and Ruby on Rails support to the award-winning development environment. Komodo IDE 4.1 is a multi-platform, multi-language IDE for dynamic languages and Ajax technologies, now featuring the most advanced Ruby and Rails editing and debugging available in any development tool.

Powerful development framework Ruby on Rails is a popular choice for developers seeking to create sophisticated web applications with ease. Komodo IDE 4.1 extends this power and flexibility with state-of-the art debugging, including support for Rails controllers and views, and a Ruby interactive shell, available on its own or from within debugging sessions. The feature-rich editor guides developers with autocomplete and calltips for Ruby and RHTML, and supports the multi-language and templated files common in Rails development. Komodo IDE 4.1 also introduces a Rails project template for painless project creation. New projects are generated with a single click, and populated with a host of useful commands for database setup and application testing.

"The last major release of Komodo redefined what was possible in a web development IDE," says Eric Promislow, senior Komodo developer. "But given the wild popularity of Ruby on Rails, we wanted to do more. Komodo IDE 4.1 is a definitive moment in Rails development, introducing more advanced tools and better performance than Rails developers have seen so far. There are new Rails-powered sites appearing every day. Increasingly, we expect those to be developed using Komodo IDE."

Komodo IDE's extensible architecture is another boon for Rails developers. Built on the Mozilla platform, Komodo IDE features XPI extension support, providing the same extensibility as Firefox, with all standard Mozilla APIs based on XUL, XBL and XPCOM, plus ActiveState's own for Python and JavaScript. A new Rails-oriented library makes it easy for developers to customize Komodo, add new commands, and share them with others. Komodo IDE 4.1 includes full macro API documentation, further backed by Ruby tutorials and an active community sharing valuable extensions through ActiveState's community site at community.activestate.com.

As with previous releases, Komodo IDE features intelligent tools for regular expressions, team development, customization and unparalleled extensibility. The result is a powerful coding environment not only for Ruby on Rails, but also CakePHP and client libraries such as the Yahoo! UI Library and Dojo. A single license covers users across Windows, Mac OS X and Linux.

Today ActiveState also released the latest iteration of Komodo Edit, a free multi-platform, multi-language editor for dynamic languages and Ajax technologies based on the award-winning Komodo IDE. Both Komodo IDE and Komodo Edit are now available.

About Komodo IDE
Komodo IDE 4 is a powerful, multi-platform, multi-language IDE for end-to-end development of dynamic web applications. Komodo IDE makes creating robust web apps fast and easy, with a rich feature set for client-side Ajax technologies such as CSS, HTML, JavaScript and XML, coupled with advanced support for dynamic languages such as Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby and Tcl. Komodo IDE licenses are $295 US and a single license covers users across Linux, Mac OS X and Windows. Learn more at www.activestate.com/komodo_ide.

About Komodo Edit
Based on the award-winning Komodo IDE, Komodo Edit is a free, feature-rich editor for the full range of Komodo-supported dynamic languages (Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby, and Tcl) and platforms (Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows). Like Komodo IDE, Komodo Edit also supports client-side Ajax technologies, including JavaScript, CSS, HTML, and XML. For more information or to download, go to www.activestate.com/komodo_edit.

About ActiveState
ActiveState is the leading provider of tools and services for dynamic languages such as JavaScript, Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby and Tcl. Millions of developers rely on ActiveState's cross-platform, professional development tools, high-quality language distributions, and enterprise services. ActiveState is owned by its employees and Pender Financial Group, a publicly traded investment company focused on technology and healthcare sectors in British Columbia. Learn more at www.activestate.com.

WestLake Training and Development Announces Ruby on Rails Developer Workshop

WestLake Training and Development, an IT training company dedicated to Web application development training, is pleased to announce its latest course offering, Introduction to Ruby on Rails. This four-day Ruby on Rails developer workshop will be held from June 12-15, 2007, at WestLake's facility in Washington, DC, and will be taught by leading contributor to the Ruby community, Chad Fowler, who also developed the course. Attendees will earn 2.4 continuing education units on completion of the class.

The course will cover Rails development and the major features of Rails through a series of hands-on, instructor-led exercises. By the end of the course, attendees will understand how to develop an Ajax-powered Web application in Rails. Students will also gain a wealth of knowledge about Ruby on Rails, including how to install and configure Ruby and RubyGems, how to send and receive mail from Rails applications, how to develop REST-style services with Rails, and more.

"I developed this Ruby on Rails training course to give attendees a head start on understanding and using Ruby on Rails." said Fowler. "This emerging language and application framework is proving to be critical to the world of Web application development, and I believe this course will be a valuable resource for those taking part."

Fowler is one of the developers and maintainers of RubyGems, the standard packaging system for Ruby, the chair of the International Rails Conference, and the co-director of Ruby Central, Inc. In addition, Fowler is the author of Rails Recipes, a copy of which all course attendees will receive, as well as the forthcoming Advanced Rails Recipes.

To register for the Introduction to Ruby on Rails course, or to learn more about any other Web application development training courses offered by WestLake, please visit www.westlaketraining.com.

About WestLake Training and Development
WestLake Training and Development was founded in 1995 and is dedicated exclusively to Web application development training. The company offers a variety of Web development classes at its training facilities in New York, NY; Dallas, TX, San Jose, CA; Chicago, IL; Dulles, VA, with its headquarters just blocks away from the White House in downtown Washington, DC. Additionally, WestLake offers dedicated private training to corporations, government agencies, and not-for-profits throughout the country and around the world. For more information, visit www.westlaketraining.com.

Source: PRWeb

Get Cool with Ruby on Rails Bootcamp at the Big Nerd Ranch, July 30 - August 3, 2007

Get Cool with Ruby on Rails Bootcamp, July 30 - August 3, 2007.

Big Nerd Ranch, Inc., leading provider of intensive training classes for programmers and system administrators, announced the return of Ruby on Rails training (http://bignerdranch.com/classes/ruby.shtml), scheduled for July 30 through August 3, 2007. Since its debut, Ruby on Rails has created a sensation among web application developers, project managers and web designers across a spectrum of industries for its robust, powerful, and easy-to-deploy framework. Big Nerd Ranch's Ruby on Rails training class brings this exciting tool for creating dynamic database-driven web applications to the public in five days of intensive instruction by a full-time Ruby on Rails developer and experienced instructor, Charles Brian Quinn.

Charles Brian Quinn, one of the founders of Slingshot Hosting for Ruby on Rails business hosting, is a partner at Highgroove Studios and a freelance Ruby on Rails consultant. He boasts an extensive career in the development and deployment of database-driven applications for a variety of Fortune 500 companies and governmental agencies, including Deloitte & Touche, Mutual of Omaha and the State of Tennessee. It is this depth of knowledge that allows for the most comprehensive and customizable Ruby on Rails training available and the best learning experience for the student.

In a recent review of Charles's February 2006 class, student Steven Harms commented, "For five days, people like you, focused on learning, learn, work and talk together. It's kinda special. Sorta like camp, but instead of popsicle stick birdhouses you build powerful computer applications. If, in five days, we could do something like this, in 90 days what sort of application could we build?"

At the end of those five days, the student will:

• Understand the major components that make up Ruby on Rails (ActiveRecord, ActionPack, ActionMailer, and ActiveSupport)
• Understand the Model View Controller (MVC) pattern, how Ruby on Rails conventions encourage efficient design, and apply Ruby on Rails best practices
• Install, setup, design, develop and deploy new Ruby on Rails applications, as well as update, manage, and maintain existing ones
• Build, parse and manipulate XML documents by generating RSS feeds, and creating and consuming Web Services
• Avoid security pitfalls and deployment problms, debug applicatins using breakpoints, logging and prototyping
• Make rich and dynamic interfaces using Ruby on Rails's extensive, easy to use AJAX libraries
• Deploy and maintain Ruby on Rails applications using Capistrano and a trusted Rails deployment stack

Most notably, the topics reviewed in the class are given real-world context drawn from Charles's own experience as a Ruby on Rails developer. Many of the big breakthroughs in mastering Ruby on Rails come in the after-class "brain dumps" and the individual assistance the instructor provides in helping the student architect his next big application. Translating the lessons into practical challenges the student is facing contextualizes the learning and minimizes the learning curve. It is this level of instruction and depth of knowledge that makes the Big Nerd Ranch Ruby on Rails training class the best in the industry.

The Big Nerd Ranch incorporates intensive training classes for Unix and Mac OS X programmers and system administrators in a retreat setting outside Atlanta, GA. Class price of $3500 includes lodging, all meals, original instruction materials, 24-hour lab access, and ground transportation to and from the Atlanta airport. Students are encouraged to bring independent projects to class, allowing for input from classmates and individual instructor attention. For more information, call 678-595-6773 or visit http://bignerdranch.com/

lynda.com Announces Release of Ruby on Rails Essential Training

January 26, 2007 -- lynda.com, the company that has specialized in self-paced training in digital media and design for over a decade, today introduced Ruby on Rails Essential Training.

Ruby on Rails aims to make building web applications simpler. In Ruby on Rails Essential Training, expert instructor Kevin Skoglund focuses on the same goal. He explains the complete process -- from understanding the fundamental concepts behind any Ruby on Rails project to creating full-featured, easy-to-maintain applications using the Ruby on Rails framework. Using the practical project of building an online store as an example, Skoglund teaches the basics of the Ruby language. He also covers how to design an application, how to build dynamic interfaces, how to structure and interact with databases, how to create a working shopping cart, and how to regulate user access with passwords. Exercise files accompany the tutorials.

"Ruby on Rails is one of the most quickly adopted and widely heralded new web programming languages. Kevin Skoglund's practical, concise, and clear training style will help legions of newcomers get up and running quickly and efficiently," says Lynda Weinman, CEO of lynda.com.

Anyone with an internet connection can access Ruby on Rails Essential Training by subscribing to lynda.com's Online Training Library™. A separate DVD version of Ruby on Rails Essential Training is scheduled for release later this month.

Subscriptions to the lynda.com Online Training Library™ start at $25 per month, and provide access to more than 16,500 movie tutorials covering a wide range of technology career tools, software, and techniques. Subscribers can access any of the computer-based training titles at their convenience. Multi-user subscriptions are also available for companies and institutions seeking to provide education and training to groups.

For free online samples of Ruby on Rails Essential Training and more detailed product information, please visit http://movielibrary.lynda.com/html/modPage.asp?ID=324.

For more information on lynda.com products, please visit http://www.lynda.com or call 1-888-335-9632.

About lynda.com
Since 1997, lynda.com has provided education and technical training solutions for designers, computer graphics specialists, digital media users, and computer owners. lynda.com products include web-based training, instructional books, CD- and DVD-based video training, self-paced online learning, and events for creative designers, instructors, students, and hobbyists. lynda.com specializes in teaching fundamental design and graphics principles along with the latest computer software, digital media technologies, and techniques.

Source: PRWeb

ActiveState Introduces Komodo Edit 4.0

VANCOUVER, BC — ActiveState Software Inc., the leading provider of development tools and services for dynamic languages, today announced the release of Komodo Edit 4.0, a free editor based on the award-winning Komodo IDE.

Komodo Edit 4.0 delivers powerful editing capabilities for dynamic languages including Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby and Tcl; plus support for browser-side code including JavaScript, CSS, HTML and XML. Background syntax checking and syntax coloring catch errors immediately, while autocomplete and calltips guide developers as they code. It is available now on Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows.

Other features include a project manager, for flexible organization of all project elements, and the Toolbox, for storing configurable "Run" commands, macros, code snippets, URLs, Live and Virtual Folders, templates, menus, toolbars and remote files. Toolbox items can be distributed to other Komodo users.

Komodo Edit 4.0 also allows users to easily extend its architecture, with support for adding advanced capabilities through Firefox-style .xpi extensions.

Also today, ActiveState announced the release of Komodo IDE 4.0, the first unified workspace for end-to-end development of dynamic web applications. A rich feature set for client-side Ajax languages, coupled with advanced support for dynamic languages, enables developers to quickly and easily create robust web apps.

Komodo IDE 4.0 features comprehensive editing and debugging, plus intelligent tools for regular expressions, team development, customization and unparalleled extensibility. The result is a powerful coding environment for framework stacks like Ruby on Rails and CakePHP, and client libraries such as the Yahoo! UI Library and Dojo. A single license covers users across Linux, Mac OS X and Windows. For more information, purchases and free trials, go to http://www.activestate.com/komodo_ide

"Our goal is to create uncompromised, extensible tools built specifically for dynamic language programmers. Our language distributions have always been free, and now Komodo Edit extends that community support into our development tools," said Matt Herdon, Product Manager, Komodo. "This is a world-class, free editor with code intelligence. It's a great introduction to Komodo IDE, a product truly unique in the depth of support for dynamic languages and web application development, but also a powerful tool in its own right."

ActiveState has recently launched the beta release of a community support site, where Komodo users can share code, custom extensions and knowledge. The site currently hosts user forums and FAQs, and will be expanded soon to include resources for creating and sharing extensions.
The site is available now at http://support.activestate.com

About Komodo Edit
ActiveState Komodo Edit 4.0 Beta 5 is available now. For more information or to download the beta, go to http://www.activestate.com/komodo_edit

About ActiveState
ActiveState is the leading provider of tools and services for dynamic languages such as JavaScript, Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby and Tcl. Millions of developers rely on ActiveState's cross-platform, professional development tools, high-quality language distributions, and enterprise services. Learn more at http://www.activestate.com/.

© 2007 ActiveState Software Inc.
All product and company names herein may be trademarks of their respective owners.

ActiveState Announces Komodo IDE

VANCOUVER, BC — ActiveState Software Inc., the leading provider of development tools and services for dynamic languages, today announced the release of Komodo IDE 4.0, a major upgrade to their award-winning development environment. With this release, developers can now create entire web applications—server, browser, and the HTTP conversation that connects them—within a single unified workspace.

Komodo IDE enables developers to write, debug, share and organize quality code in a customizable programming environment. With 4.0, Komodo's support for dynamic languages such as Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby and Tcl, is extended to browser-side languages including JavaScript, CSS, HTML and XML.

New features, including JavaScript debugging, DOM viewer, HTTP Inspector and code intelligence, provide deep support for Ajax techniques, making Komodo IDE essential for developers using dynamic languages and modern web development practices. Support is also extended to framework stacks like Ruby on Rails and CakePHP, and client libraries such as the Yahoo!

UI Library and Dojo, allowing users to remain in the Komodo workspace for the entire development process.

Thousands of users were involved in the beta program, eager to provide feedback on a product many consider indispensable: "We use Komodo IDE to build our internal systems," says Jonathan Eunice, Founder and Principal IT Advisor, Illuminata. "It has saved us an amazing amount of time and effort."

Komodo IDE 4.0 also allows users to easily extend its architecture, with support for adding advanced capabilities through Firefox-style .xpi extensions.

Says Matt Herdon, Product Manager, Komodo, "Above all else, this release is for the community. We are absolutely committed to giving them a world-class IDE designed specifically for their languages—one they can invest in for the long term, with extensions, code and shared know-how.

"Over a year of development and quality assurance effort went into 4.0, not to mention excellent pre-release feedback from users. The web development support has been very much driven by their needs. People want an easy way to build web apps with dynamic languages, and that's what Komodo IDE is all about."

ActiveState has recently launched the beta release of a community support site, which currently hosts Komodo user forums and FAQs and will be expanded soon to include resources for creating and sharing extensions. The site is available now at http://support.activestate.com
Shane Caraveo, Komodo Tech Lead, welcomes the involvement. "Every developer has different needs; different ways of working. With this release, we focused on putting control in the hands of our users.

Komodo's open architecture lets people add a lot of power with just a few lines of code, and we're very excited to see how the community takes advantage of that."

Also today, ActiveState announced the introduction of Komodo Edit, a free multi-language editor. Komodo Edit provides advanced editing capabilities for dynamic languages, including Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby and Tcl, plus support for browser-side code including, JavaScript, CSS, HTML and XML. Komodo Edit, currently in beta, is available at http://www.activestate.com/komodo_edit

About Komodo IDE
ActiveState Komodo IDE 4.0 is available now. A standard license for Linux, Mac OS X and Windows is $245 through February 28, 2007, and $295 thereafter. Discounted upgrade pricing is also available through February 28, 2007. For more information, purchases and free trials, go to http://www.activestate.com/komodo_ide

About ActiveState
ActiveState is the leading provider of tools and services for dynamic languages such as JavaScript, Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby and Tcl. Millions of developers rely on ActiveState's cross-platform, professional development tools, high-quality language distributions, and enterprise services. Learn more at http://www.activestate.com.

© 2007 ActiveState Software Inc.
All product and company names herein may be trademarks of their respective owners.