Comment by mgkimsal | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mgkimsal | Hacker News Reader

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1. Install XCode and homebrew

2. sudo brew install {postgresql,rbenv,ruby-build}

3. Close terminal. Open terminal.

4. mkdir proj && cd proj && rbenv install 1.9.2-p290 && rbenv local 1.9.2-p290

5. gem install rails && rbenv rehash

6. rails new foo

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"hey, download this all-inclusive, up-to-date, guaranteed to work disk image straight from us!"

Wait, how is that different from above?

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Really? You really have to ask how those two processes are different?

"stop dumbing it down artificially"

If (sometimes competing) complexities weren't continually added, there wouldn't be a need to 'dumb it down'.

"(and stuff always breaks later)"

Wow. Most other web framework communities don't have that much problems with 'stuff always breaking later'. Maybe Rails has reached a tipping point?

"There simply is no other way unless you plan to re-invent homebrew and rbenv along the way."

Or until someone else does 'reinvent' one of those, and all the cool kids start using it, leaving everyone who learned the 'legacy' way out in the cold without an upgrade path beyond "start over".

with different behaviors and errors from what the "big guys" are using

I think part of the purpose of the kickstarter project is having one of the 'big guys' behind it. Supposedly that would mean at least one (or more) of the 'big guys' would indeed be using the same process as the 'newbs', reducing this chasm.

Sounds like you're threatened some by this - it was hard for you, therefore it should always be hard for everyone for now and forever.

Sounds like you're threatened some by this - it was hard for you, therefore it should always be hard for everyone for now and forever.

Yes, I'm threatened by this. But not in the way you think, because as shown above, it's not really hard. It's 5 lines. What's wrong with kids these days?

I'm threatened because I'm the guy who comes in to clean up after "junior programmers" who couldn't even be bothered to learn 5 lines to install their dev-environment and who consequently also don't have the slightest clue about basic realities such as "diskspace is finite" or "No, /Users/Bob/rails/tmp is not a valid path in production".

At least give the kids a chance to learn. Don't lure them with shortcuts that result in unsustainable habits that cause great frustration in the long run. Unlearning is harder than learning.

Rails with its false sense of simplicity is breeding plenty diletantes already as it is. We need less of that, not more.

It's not "5 lines", and it's not about "junior programmers". My designers need to work with my Rails apps, and learning the intricacies of setting up a Rails stack is not their job description. Just like maintaining their dev environment isn't mine. There's a bigger issue here than "those kids will never learn things the hard way".

It's not "5 lines"

Would you mind scrolling up to my original comment where I posted the exact 5 lines?

My designers need to work with my Rails apps

Then you should have noticed that installing rails is the least of your worries. Database seeds, missing dependencies, test-users, broken fixtures, broken mocks, missing external APIs, version control conflicts, gem screw-ups, failing migrations, rails upgrades, differences to the production setup. Those are the daily timesinks over here in the real world.

The initial rails installation doesn't even register in the grand scheme of things.

I can't tell what you're actually arguing for or against in this thread. There seem to be two different things:

1) The rails.app project wants to solve a problem that doesn't exist. There are a lot of comments here from other people who think getting started with rails is confusing, and who point out that your much-touted five steps are not complete, canonical, or easy, so I won't further beat that dead horse.

2) There are many harder problems you'll come across when doing rails professionally. This is incredibly true, nobody disagrees, but it's irrelevant to the rails.app project.

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