PUBLIC MARKS from oseres with tags ruby & mac

A few weeks before every Pragmatic Studio course, we send out homework to help attendees prepare for the course. The homework includes instructions for getting any required software installed and tested on their laptop, and some recommended reading. Our goal is to make sure that everyone turns up on the first day ready to program. So we try to catch installation problems early and help folks through them. Sending out prep homework ahead of time also means that attendees can begin to experiment on their own. As a result, they often jot down questions to ask during our time together. In a way, our courses start the moment you register. We’re continually updating our homework to take into account new software versions and new ways of doing things. With the topics we teach, there’s never a dull moment. For the Rails Studio in particular, we’ve been teaching Rails 3 for a while now. And although you can use Ruby 1.8.7 with Rails 3, we’re beginning to nudge folks to try Ruby 1.9.2.