This is an introductory user’s guide to Ruby programming language. It is available online.
Book Description
Ruby is “an interpreted scripting language for quick and easy object-oriented programming” — what does this mean?
interpreted scripting language:
- ability to make operating system calls directly
- powerful string operations and regular expressions
- immediate feedback during development
quick and easy:
- variable declarations are unnecessary
- variables are not typed
- syntax is simple and consistent
- memory management is automatic
object oriented programming:
- everything is an object
- classes, methods, inheritance, etc.
- singleton methods
- “mixin” functionality by module
- iterators and closures
also:
- multiple precision integers
- convenient exception processing
- dynamic loading
- threading support
If you are unfamiliar with some of the concepts above, read on, and don’t worry. The mantra of the ruby language is quick and easy.
Table of Contents
- Getting started
- Simple examples
- Strings
- Regular expressions
- Arrays
- Back to the simple examples
- Control structures
- Iterators
- Object-oriented thinking
- Methods
- Classes
- Inheritance
- Redefinition of methods
- Access control
- Singleton methods
- Modules
- Procedure objects
- Variables
- Global variables
- Instance variables
- Local variables
- Class constants
- Exception processing: rescue
- Exception processing: ensure
- Accessors
- Object initialization
- Nuts and bolts