Chapter 1. Ruby on Rails, the framework
This chapter covers
- Exploring Ruby on Rails
- Building the foundations of a Ruby on Rails app
- Working with the scaffold generator
Welcome aboard! It’s great to have you with us on this journey through the world of Ruby on Rails. Ruby on Rails is known throughout the lands as a powerful web framework that helps developers rapidly build modern web applications. In particular, it provides lots of niceties to help you in your quest to develop a full-featured real-world application and be happy doing it. Great developers are happy developers. There’s much more to the Rails world than might appear at first glance, but not overwhelmingly too much. And what a first glance! Oh, you two haven’t met? Well, time for some introductions then!
Ruby on Rails is a framework built on the Ruby language, hence the name Ruby on Rails. The Ruby language was created back in 1993 by Yukihiro “Matz” Matsumuto of Japan. Ruby was released to the general public in 1995. Since then, it has earned both a reputation and an enthusiastic following for its clean design, elegant syntax, and wide selection of tools available in the standard library and via a package management system called RubyGems. It also has a worldwide community and many active contributors constantly improving the language and the ecosystem around it.