Ruby...I LOVE YOU (My Romance with a Computer Language)

It's so true the old saying about when you start a learning a new subject, at first you don't even realize what you don't know, then eventually you start to realize more and more just how much you don't know. One fine day you wake up and realize: "I don't know ANYTHING! :)"...Oh what a glorious day!

I don't know ANYTHING!, and I'm fine with that I'm loving the journey. When I first started learning RoR there were 2 basic camps of thought: Learn Rails first or Learn Ruby first. I choose Rails mainly because I felt like I was making fast progress because I saw results very quickly just by typing in: "rails new ___" and then BOOM! I'm a RoR developer. Learning Rails first is fun, and I'm glad I did it that way. However now I am feeling like: "Crap, if I don't actually know the language, I'm helpless.".

With the Berkeley edX classes coming up in 3 days, I'm pushing Ruby as hard as I can to put myself in a better position for absorbing the new material in the class. Zed Shaw's book Learn Ruby The Hard Way: Lesson 45 was tougher than I thought.  I've decided instead of taking a week to make the game on my own I'm going to pair program  with my brother Cody on Sunday and just study till we get the game right.

I am going through Chris Pine's "Learn To Program" book again from start to finish. I got through Chapter 5 of 15 today. I plan on knocking out the other 10 Chapters tomorrow. I'm doing all the training exercises for each chapter again just to try and make sure I have the basics down pat so I don't get too mentally swamped come class time.That's where I'm at in my learning journey. I'm dying to learn at a faster rate, but I'm not frustrated with the Language.

Except for the fact that I must take care of my awesome wife and 2 boys. I almost wish I could be locked away in a dark dungeon somewhere fed only bread and water so as to motivate me and not let out till I was a professional RoR developer. Of course that might be considered torture, but I bet my mind would hyper focus like a super human.

I'm hoping to put in 6 hours tomorrow and a big study day on Sunday. It's study time people, Let's rock & roll:) - Josh