Wow! eBook – Blog

Book Description

Refactoring–the art of improving the design of existing code–has taken the world by storm. So has Ruby. Now, for the first time, there’s a refactoring workbook designed from the ground up for the dynamic Ruby language.

Refactoring in Ruby gives you all the realistic, hands-on practice you need to refactor Ruby code quickly and effectively. You’ll discover how to recognize “code smells,” which signal opportunities for improvement, and then perfect your program’s design one small, safe step at a time.

The book shows you when and how to refactor with both legacy code and during new test-driven development, and walks you through real-world refactoring in detail. The workbook concludes with several applications designed to help practice refactoring in realistic domains, plus a handy code review checklist you’ll refer to again and again. Along the way, you’ll learn powerful lessons about designing higher quality Ruby software–lessons that will enable you to experience the joy of writing consistently great code.

Refactoring in Ruby will help you

• Recognize why poor code design occurs, so you can prevent it from occurring in your own code
• Master better design techniques that lead to more efficient, reliable, and maintainable software
• Fix code that’s too long, large, or difficult to follow Download Now »

Book Description

Google and YouTube use Python because it’s highly adaptable, easy to maintain, and allows for rapid development. If you want to write high-quality, efficient code that’s easily integrated with other languages and tools, this hands-on book will help you be productive with Python quickly — whether you’re new to programming or just new to Python. It’s an easy-to-follow self-paced tutorial, based on author and Python expert Mark Lutz’s popular training course.

Each chapter contains a stand-alone lesson on a key component of the language, and includes a unique Test Your Knowledge section with practical exercises and quizzes, so you can practice new skills and test your understanding as you go. You’ll find lots of annotated examples and illustrations to help you get started with Python 3.0.

• Learn about Python’s major built-in object types, such as numbers, lists, and dictionaries
• Create and process objects using Python statements, and learn Python’s general syntax model
• Structure and reuse code using functions, Python’s basic procedural tool
• Learn about Python modules: packages of statements, functions, and other tools, organized into larger components
• Discover Python’s object-oriented programming tool for structuring code
• Learn about the exception-handling model, and development tools for writing larger programs
• Explore advanced Python tools including decorators, descriptors, metaclasses, and Unicode processing Download Now »

Book Description

Want to learn all about Ruby on Rails 2.0, the web application framework that is inspiring developers around the world?

The second edition of this practical, hands on book will:

• show you how to install Ruby on Rails on Windows, Mac, or Linux
• walk you, step by step, through the development of a Web 2.0 social news application, just like digg.com
• show you how to test, debug, benchmark, and deploy your Rails application

Unlike other Rails books, this book doesn’t assume that you are an experienced web developer, or that you’ve used Ruby before. An entire chapter is devoted to learning Ruby in a fun way, using the interactive Ruby console, so you can follow along at home. You’ll be an accomplished Ruby programmer in no time!

The example application that the book builds – a user-generated news web site – is built upon with each following chapter, and concepts such as sessions, cookies and basic AJAX usage are gradually introduced. Different aspects of Rails, such as user authentication, session cookies, and automated testing are explored with each feature that is added to the application.

The book finishes with chapters on debugging, benchmarking and deployment to a live web server.

By the end of the book, you’ll have built a fully-featured Web 2.0 application and deployed it to the Web. And all code is up-to-date for Rails 2.0, so you can begin coding immediately with the latest version of Rails. Download Now »

Book Description

Scripted GUI Testing with Ruby is a practical, quick-moving tutorial based on real life, and real-world GUI applications.Right out of the gate you’ll start working with code to drive a desktop GUI. You’ll discover the kinds of gotchas and edge cases that don’t exist in simple, toy programs. As you add more tests, you’ll learn how to organize your test code and write lucid examples. The result is a series of “smoke tests” team will run on Continuous Integration servers.

Next, we’ll explore a variety of different testing tips and tricks. You’ll employ a series of increasingly random and punishing test monkeys to try to crash programs. Table-driven techniques will show you how to check dozens of different input combinations. See how to use longer acceptance tests (in the form of stories) to represent the way a typical customer would use your program.

The book uses examples from Windows, OS X, and cross-platform Java desktop programs as well as Web applications. You’ll develop test scripts in Ruby; you don’t need to be a Ruby expert, but basic comfort with the language will be helpful.

About the Author
Ian Dees was first bitten by the programming bug in 1986 on a Timex Sinclair 1000, and has been having a blast in his software apprenticeship ever since. Download Now »

Book Description

This is a book for the Ruby programmer who’s never written a Mac app before. Through this hands-on tutorial, you’ll learn all about the Cocoa framework for programming on Mac OS X. Join the author’s journey as this experienced Ruby programmer delves into the Cocoa framework right from the beginning, answering the same questions and solving the same problems that you’ll face.

Together you’ll build a single application that threads throughout the book, and it’s not a toy. You’ll cover topics that may not be the flashiest parts of Cocoa, but they’re ones you’ll need to know to create robust, feature-rich applications for yourself. And you’ll learn more than just Cocoa and RubyCocoa, you’ll get first-hand effective agile development practices. You’ll see test-first development of user-interface code, little domain-specific languages that take advantage of Ruby features, and other Rubyish tricks.

At the end of the book, you’ll be ready to write a real Mac OS X application that can be distributed to real users.

About the Author
Brian Marick learned Ruby in 2001 because Dave Thomas and Andy Hunt, original authors of Programming Ruby, wouldn’t let him off a shuttle bus until he said he would. He’s been programming in it ever since, and he’s made a special effort to teach it to software testers. His previous book is Everyday Scripting with Ruby, which began as a tutorial for those very testers. Download Now »

Book Description

FXRuby is a highly object-oriented toolkit for building lean, mean, cross-platform graphical user interfaces in Ruby. Since its initial release in 2001, FXRuby has become one of the most popular GUI choices for Ruby developers. This book is your best resource for rapidly learning how to develop powerful, sophisticated GUIs in your favorite programming language.If you’re a newcomer to GUI programming, this book will introduce you to the basics of FXRuby programming by leading you through building a GUI application with FXRuby from start to finish. If you’re an experienced software developer who just needs to get up to speed on FXRuby and what it can do for you, this book will help you put FXRuby to work in your Ruby-based applications. Along the way, you’ll learn how to leverage FXRuby’s vast collection of user interface elements to build visually rich user interfaces. You’ll see how FXRuby uses the concept of sending messages between objects to implement event-driven applications, and how you can most effectively use layout managers to construct flexible user interfaces.

Go beyond the basics with proven, practical knowledge and techniques for developing real-world GUI programs in Ruby.

About the Author
Lyle Johnson is the lead developer of FXRuby, one of the most popular graphical user interface libraries for the Ruby programming language. An active participant in the Ruby programming community since 2000, he also co-authored the Ruby Developer’s Guide, one of the first English-language books about Ruby. For the past fifteen years, he’s developed software applications for a variety of industries, including engineering modeling and simulation, biotechnology and computer network defense. Download Now »