The Well-Grounded Rubyist, Third Edition
This books provides a thorough, in depth introduction to the Ruby programming language.
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The Well-Grounded Rubyist, Third Edition is a perfect tutorial for newcomers to Ruby and a great way for experienced Rubyists to deepen their understanding of the language. This thorough book starts with Ruby fundamentals and offers an in-depth guide to all major language features. In this newly-revised third edition covering Ruby 2.5, expert authors David A. Black and Joe Leo make even familiar concepts seem new and interesting.
Table of Contents takes you straight to the bookdetailed table of contents
Part 1: Ruby foundations
1. Bootstrapping your Ruby literacy
1.1. Basic Ruby language literacy
1.1.1. A Ruby syntax survival kit
1.1.2. The variety of Ruby identifiers
1.1.3. Method calls, messages, and Ruby objects
1.1.4. Writing and saving a simple program
1.1.5. Feeding the program to Ruby
1.1.6. Keyboard and file I/O
1.2. Anatomy of the Ruby installation
1.2.1. The Ruby standard library subdirectory (RbConfig::CONFIG[“rubylibdir”])
1.2.2. The C extensions directory (RbConfig::CONFIG[“archdir”])
1.2.3. The site_ruby (RbConfig::CONFIG[“sitedir”]) and vendor_ruby (RbConfig::CONFIG[“vendordir”]) directories
1.2.4. Standard Ruby gems and the gems directory
1.3. Ruby extensions and programming libraries
1.3.1. Loading external files and extensions
1.3.2. “Load”-ing a file in the default load path
1.3.3. “Require”-ing a feature
1.3.4. require_relative
1.4. Out-of-the-box Ruby tools and applications
1.4.1. Interpreter command-line switches
1.4.2. A closer look at interactive Ruby interpretation with irb
1.4.3. ri and RDoc
1.4.4. The rake task-management utility
1.4.5. Installing packages with the gem command
1.5. Summary
2. Objects, methods, and local variables
2.1. Talking to objects
2.1.1. Ruby and object orientation
2.1.2. Creating a generic object
2.1.3. Methods that take arguments
2.1.4. The return value of a method
2.2. Crafting an object: The behavior of a ticket
2.2.1. The ticket object, behavior first
2.2.2. Querying the ticket object
2.2.3. Shortening the ticket code via string interpolation
2.2.4. Ticket availability: Expressing Boolean state in a method
2.3. The innate behaviors of an object
2.3.1. Identifying objects uniquely with the object_id method
2.3.2. Querying an object’s abilities with the respond_to? method
2.3.3. Sending messages to objects with the send method
2.4. A close look at method arguments
2.4.1. Required and optional arguments
2.4.2. Default values for arguments
2.4.3. Order of parameters and arguments
2.4.4. What you can’t do in argument lists
2.5. Local variables and variable assignment
2.5.1. Variables, objects, and references
2.5.2. References in variable assignment and reassignment
2.5.3. References and method arguments
2.5.4. Local variables and the things that look like them
2.6. Summary
3. Organizing objects with classes
3.1. Classes and instances
3.1.1. Instance methods
3.1.2. Overriding methods
3.1.3. Reopening classes
3.2. Instance variables and object state
3.2.1. Initializing an object with state
3.3. Setter methods
3.3.1. The equal sign (=) in method names
3.3.2. Syntactic sugar for assignment-like methods
3.3.3. Setter methods unleashed
3.4. Attributes and the attr_* method family
3.4.1. Automating the creation of attributes
3.4.2. Summary of attr_* methods
3.5. Inheritance and the Ruby class hierarchy
3.5.1. Single inheritance: One to a customer
3.5.2. Object ancestry and the not-so-missing link: The Object class
3.6. Classes as objects and message receivers
3.6.1. Creating class objects
3.6.2. How class objects call methods
3.6.3. A singleton method by any other name…
3.6.4. When, and why, to write a class method
3.6.5. Class methods vs. instance methods
3.7. Constants up close
3.7.1. Basic use of constants
3.7.2. Reassigning vs. modifying constants
3.8. Nature vs. nurture in Ruby objects
3.9. Summary
4. Modules and program organization
4.1. Basics of module creation and use
4.1.1. A module encapsulating “stacklikeness”
4.1.2. Mixing a module into a class
4.1.3. Using the module further
4.2. Modules, classes, and method lookup
4.2.1. Illustrating the basics of method lookup
4.2.2. Defining the same method more than once
4.2.3. How prepend works
4.2.4. How extend works
4.2.5. The rules of method lookup summarized
4.2.6. Going up the method search path with super
4.2.7. Inspecting method hierarchies with method and super_method
4.3. The method_missing method
4.3.1. Combining method_missing and super
4.4. Class/module design and naming
4.4.1. Mix-ins and/or inheritance
4.4.2. Nesting modules and classes
4.5. Summary
5. The default object (self), scope, and visibility
5.1. Understanding self, the current/default object
5.1.1. Who gets to be self, and where
5.1.2. The top-level self object
5.1.3. Self inside class, module, and method definitions
5.1.4. Self as the default receiver of messages
5.1.5. Resolving instance variables through self
5.2. Determining scope
5.2.1. Global scope and global variables
5.2.2. Local scope
5.2.3. The interaction between local scope and self
5.2.4. Scope and resolution of constants
5.2.5. Class variable syntax, scope, and visibility
5.3. Deploying method-access rules
5.3.1. Private methods
5.3.2. Protected methods
5.4. Writing and using top-level methods
5.4.1. Defining a top-level method
5.4.2. Predefined (built-in) top-level methods
5.5. Summary
6. Control-flow techniques
6.1. Conditional code execution
6.1.1. The if keyword and friends
6.1.2. Assignment syntax in condition bodies and tests
6.1.3. case statements
6.2. Repeating actions with loops
6.2.1. Unconditional looping with the loop method
6.2.2. Conditional looping with the while and until keywords
6.2.3. Looping based on a list of values
6.3. Iterators and code blocks
6.3.1. The ingredients of iteration
6.3.2. Iteration, home-style
6.3.3. The anatomy of a method call
6.3.4. Curly braces vs. do/end in code block syntax
6.3.5. Implementing times
6.3.6. The importance of being each
6.3.7. From each to map
6.3.8. Block parameters and variable scope
6.4. Error handling and exceptions
6.4.1. Raising and rescuing exceptions
6.4.2. The rescue keyword to the rescue!
6.4.3. Raising exceptions explicitly
6.4.4. Capturing an exception in a rescue clause
6.4.5. The ensure clause
6.4.6. Creating your own exception classes
6.5. Summary
Part 2: Built-in classes and modules
7. Built-in essentials
7.1. Ruby’s literal constructors
7.2. Recurrent syntactic sugar
7.2.1. Defining operators by defining methods
7.2.2. Customizing unary operators
7.3. Bang (!) methods and "danger"
7.3.1. Destructive (receiver-changing) effects as danger
7.3.2. Destructiveness and "danger" vary independently
7.4. Built-in and custom to_* (conversion) methods
7.4.1. String conversion: to_s and other methods defined on Object
7.4.2. Array conversion with to_a and the * operator
7.4.3. Numerical conversion with to_i and to_f
7.4.4. Role-playing to_* methods
7.5. Boolean states, Boolean objects, and nil
7.5.1. True and false as states
7.5.2. true and false as objects
7.5.3. The special object nil
7.6. Comparing two objects
7.6.1. Equality tests
7.6.2. Comparisons and the Comparable module
7.7. Inspecting object capabilities
7.7.1. Listing an object’s methods
7.7.2. Querying class and module objects
7.7.3. Filtered and selected method lists
7.8. Summary
8. Strings, symbols, and other scalar objects
8.1. Working with strings
8.1.1. String notation
8.1.2. Basic string manipulation
8.1.3. Querying strings
8.1.4. String comparison and ordering
8.1.5. String transformation
8.1.6. String conversions
8.1.7. String encoding: A brief introduction
8.2. Symbols and their uses
8.2.1. Chief characteristics of symbols
8.2.2. Symbols and identifiers
8.2.3. Symbols in practice
8.2.4. Strings and symbols in comparison
8.3. Numerical objects
8.4. Times and dates
8.4.1. Instantiating date/time objects
8.4.2. Date/time query methods
8.4.3. Date/time formatting methods
8.4.4. Date/time conversion methods
8.5. Summary
9. Collection and container objects
9.1. Arrays and hashes in comparison
9.2. Collection handling with arrays
9.2.1. Creating a new array
9.2.2. Inserting, retrieving, and removing array elements
9.2.3. Combining arrays with other arrays
9.2.4. Array transformations
9.2.5. Array querying
9.3. Hashes
9.3.1. Creating a new hash
9.3.2. Inserting, retrieving, and removing hash pairs
9.3.3. Specifying default hash values and behavior
9.3.4. Combining hashes with other hashes
9.3.5. Hash transformations
9.3.6. Hash querying
9.3.7. Hashes as final method arguments
9.3.8. A detour back to argument syntax: Named (keyword) arguments
9.4. Ranges
9.4.1. Creating a range
9.4.2. Range-inclusion logic
9.5. Sets
9.5.1. Set creation
9.5.2. Manipulating set elements
9.5.3. Subsets and supersets
9.6. Summary
10. Collections central: Enumerable and Enumerator
10.1. Gaining enumerability through each
10.2. Enumerable Boolean queries
10.3. Enumerable searching and selecting
10.3.1. Getting the first match with find
10.3.2. Getting all matches with find_all (a.k.a. select) and reject
10.3.3. Selecting on threequal matches with grep
10.3.4. Organizing selection results with group_by and partition
10.4. Element-wise enumerable operations
10.4.1. The first method
10.4.2. The take and drop methods
10.4.3. The min and max methods
10.5. Relatives of each
10.5.1. reverse_each
10.5.2. The each_with_index method (and each.with_index)
10.5.3. The each_slice and each_cons methods
10.5.4. The slice_ family of methods
10.5.5. The cycle method
10.5.6. Enumerable reduction with inject
10.6. The map method
10.6.1. The return value of map
10.6.2. In-place mapping with map!
10.7. Strings as quasi-enumerables
10.8. Sorting enumerables
10.8.1. Defining sort-order logic with a block
10.8.2. Concise sorting with sort_by
10.8.3. Sorting enumerables and the Comparable module
10.9. Enumerators and the next dimension of enumerability
10.9.1. Creating enumerators with a code block
10.9.2. Attaching enumerators to other objects
10.9.3. Implicit creation of enumerators by blockless iterator calls
10.10. Enumerator semantics and uses
10.10.1. How to use an enumerator’s each method
10.10.2. Protecting objects with enumerators
10.10.3. Fine-grained iteration with enumerators
10.10.4. Adding enumerability with an enumerator
10.11. Enumerator method chaining
10.11.1. Economizing on intermediate objects
10.11.2. Indexing enumerables with with_index
10.11.3. Exclusive-or operations on strings with enumerators
10.12. Lazy enumerators
10.12.1. FizzBuzz with a lazy enumerator
10.13. Summary
11. Regular expressions and regexp-based string operations
11.1. What are regular expressions?
11.2. Writing regular expressions
11.2.1. Seeing patterns
11.2.2. Simple matching with literal regular expressions
11.3. Building a pattern in a regular expression
11.3.1. Literal characters in patterns
11.3.2. The dot wildcard character (.)
11.3.3. Character classes
11.4. Matching, substring captures, and MatchData
11.4.1. Capturing submatches with parentheses
11.4.2. Match success and failure
11.4.3. Two ways of getting the captures
11.4.4. Other MatchData information
11.5. Fine-tuning regular expressions with quantifiers, anchors, and modifiers
11.5.1. Constraining matches with quantifiers
11.5.2. Greedy (and non-greedy) quantifiers
11.5.3. Regular expression anchors and assertions
11.5.4. Modifiers
11.6. Converting strings and regular expressions to each other
11.6.1. String-to-regexp idioms
11.6.2. Going from a regular expression to a string
11.7. Common methods that use regular expressions
11.7.1. String#scan
11.7.2. String#split
11.7.3. sub/sub! and gsub/gsub!
11.7.4. Case equality and grep
11.8. Summary
12. File and I/O operations
12.1. How Ruby’s I/O system is put together
12.1.1. The IO class
12.1.2. IO objects as enumerables
12.1.3. A little more about keyboard input
12.2. Basic file operations
12.2.1. The basics of reading from files
12.2.2. Line-based file reading
12.2.3. Byte- and character-based file reading
12.2.4. Seeking and querying file position
12.2.5. Reading files with File class methods
12.2.6. Writing to files
12.2.7. Using blocks to scope file operations
12.2.8. File enumerability
12.2.9. File I/Oexceptions and errors
12.3. Querying IO and File objects
12.3.1. Getting information from the File class and the FileTest module
12.3.2. Deriving file information with File::Stat
12.4. Directory manipulation with the Dir class
12.4.1. Reading a directory’s entries
12.4.2. Directory manipulation and querying
12.5. File tools from the standard library
12.5.1. The FileUtils module
12.5.2. The Pathname class
12.5.3. The StringIO class
12.5.4. The open-uri library
12.6. Summary
Part 3: Ruby dynamics
13. Object individuation
13.1. Where the singleton methods are: The singleton class
13.1.1. Dual determination through singleton classes
13.1.2. Examining and modifying a singleton class directly
13.1.3. Singleton classes on the method-lookup path
13.1.4. The singleton_class method
13.1.5. Class methods in (even more) depth
13.2. Modifying Ruby’s core classes and modules
13.2.1. The risks of changing core functionality
13.2.2. The risks of changing core functionality
13.2.3. Additive changes
13.2.4. Pass-through overrides
13.2.5. Per-object changes with extend
13.2.6. Using refinements to affect core behavior
13.3. BasicObject as ancestor and class
13.3.1. Using BasicObject
13.3.2. Implementing a subclass of BasicObject
13.4. Summary
14. Callable and runnable objects
14.1. Basic anonymous functions: The Proc class
14.1.1. Proc objects
14.1.2. Procs and blocks and how they differ
14.1.3. Block-proc conversions
14.1.4. Using Symbol#to_proc for conciseness
14.1.5. Procs as closures
14.1.6. Proc parameters and arguments
14.2. Creating functions with lambda and →
14.3. Methods as objects
14.3.1. Capturing Method objects
14.3.2. The rationale for methods as objects
14.4. The eval family of methods
14.4.1. Executing arbitrary strings as code with eval
14.4.2. The dangers of eval
14.4.3. The instance_eval method
14.4.4. Using class_eval (a.k.a. module_eval)
14.5. Parallel execution with threads
14.5.1. Killing, stopping, and starting threads
14.5.2. A threaded date server
14.5.3. Writing a chat server using sockets and threads
14.5.4. Threads and variables
14.5.5. Manipulating thread keys
14.6. Issuing system commands from inside Ruby programs
14.6.1. The system method and backticks
14.6.2. Communicating with programs via open and popen3
14.7. Summary
15. Callbacks, hooks, and runtime introspection
15.1. Callbacks and hooks
15.1.1. Intercepting unrecognized messages with method_missing
15.1.2. Trapping include and prepend operations
15.1.3. Intercepting extend
15.1.4. Intercepting inheritance with Class#inherited
15.1.5. The Module#const_missing method
15.1.6. The method_added and singleton_method_added methods
15.2. Interpreting object capability queries
15.2.1. Listing an object’s non-private methods
15.2.2. Listing private and protected methods
15.2.3. Getting class and module instance methods
15.2.4. Listing objects' singleton methods
15.3. Introspection of variables and constants
15.3.1. Listing local and global variables
15.3.2. Listing instance variables
15.4. Tracing execution
15.4.1. Examining the stack trace with caller
15.4.2. Writing a tool for parsing stack traces
15.5. Callbacks and method inspection in practice
15.5.1. MicroTest background: MiniTest
15.5.2. Specifying and implementing MicroTest
15.6. Summary
16. Ruby and Functional Programming
16.1. Understanding pure functions
16.1.1. Methods with side effects
16.1.2. Pure functions and Referential Transparency in Ruby
16.1.3. Side effects in Ruby’s built-in methods
16.1.4. Modifying an Object’s State
16.2. Immutability
16.2.1. Object#freeze and Object#frozen?
16.2.2. Frozen String Literals
16.3. Higher-order Functions
16.3.1. Method Chaining
16.3.2. Kernel#itself and Kernel#yield_self
16.3.3. Functions that Return Functions
16.3.4. Currying and Partial Function Application
16.4. Recursion
16.4.1. Lazy Evaluation
16.4.2. Tail-call Optimization
16.5. Summary
About the Technology
Ruby is a dynamic language perfect for creating applications, development tools, and administrative scripts. Because it's the backbone of the well-loved Ruby on Rails web framework, Ruby has become one of the most popular programming languages in the world. This elegant language boasts a friendly development community, countless libraries, and amazing productivity tools. Isn't it time you discovered the benefits of being a well-grounded Rubyist?About the book
The Well-Grounded Rubyist, Third Edition is a beautifully written tutorial that begins with your first Ruby program and takes you all the way to sophisticated topics like reflection, threading, and recursion. Ruby masters David A. Black and Joe Leo distill their years of knowledge for you, concentrating on the language and its uses so you can use Ruby in any way you choose. This Third Edition includes coverage of the latest Ruby features such as the safe navigation operator, method currying, writing side effect-free code, and recursion.What's inside
- Fully updated to cover the latest in Ruby 2.5
- Clear explanations of Ruby concepts and how to apply them
- Simple examples to seal in the learning
- Prepares you to use Ruby anywhere for any purpose
About the reader
This book teaches Ruby from the ground up. The reader should have command of basic programming concepts in another language.About the authors
David A. Black is an internationally-known Ruby developer, author, trainer, speaker, and event organizer, as well as a co-founder of Ruby Central. Joseph Leo III is a Ruby teacher, mentor, and community advocate. He is the lead organizer of the Gotham Ruby Conference (GoRuCo) and founder of Def Method.
Manning Early Access Program (MEAP) Read chapters as they are written, get the finished eBook as soon as it’s ready, and receive the pBook long before it's in bookstores.
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Great foundation for becoming a Ruby expert. Basic experience is a plus but not necessary for picking up the language.
As a person who loves to understand why things work as they are, this book fulfills my needs and some more.