I’ve set out to learn a new programming language (for several reasons that will be disclosed at a later date), the language of choice was Ruby, so that eventually I could learn some Ruby on Rails for the purpose of getting back into web development.  I have found a couple of nice ways to help with learning the Ruby programming language.

Ruby Koans

A couple weeks back while attending a geek dinner, someone at the table mentioned the Ruby Koans as an interesting way to learn the Ruby programming language.  They were right.  What are the Ruby Koans?  They are a set of unit tests all set to fail and the object is to make each test past, one at a time.  The goal is that, as you complete the code to make each test pass, you eventually learn the Ruby language.  I’ve been doing them for the last week and a half with great results.  I’m by no means an expert in Ruby but I am learning some interesting things about the language.

RubyQuiz.com

RubyQuiz.com is an archive website of the first 150-ish quizzes that took place on the Ruby Talk mailing list.  While the quizzes still happen on the mailing list, this website only has the first 156 quizzes posted to the mailing list.  The idea is that you are presented with a problem that you must solve using the Ruby language.  Several solutions are provided for each quiz so you can compare your answers.  It’s a great way to get your mind thinking in a Ruby way, once you’ve become familiar with the language (see the Koans above).