Learning Rails

Test Your Knowledge

Quiz

1. What is cloud computing and how can it help you develop in Rails?

2. What’s the name of the Ruby application packaging utility and how do you install Rails with it?

3. In what instances would you avoid WEBrick?

4. Why should you install a particular version of Ruby on your platform when Ruby already comes installed?

Answers

1. Cloud computing provides access to virtual servers. You don’t even have to know which server is hosting which part of the application. Mostly, you’ll consider deploying your Rails applications on cloud computing environments, but Heroku offers you a chance to develop your applications through a web interface that runs on Amazon’s EC2 cloud computing platform.

2. RubyGems, or just “gems,” which is run with the gem command, is Ruby’s application packager. To install the latest version of Rails and all its dependencies, just type gem install rails.

3. WEBrick is great for testing your Rails applications, but definitely not the best choice for deployments where performance matters.

4. Rails is still running on version 1.8 of Ruby, not the latest 1.9, but it requires features in the more recent versions of 1.8, notably 1.8.6.