RUBY ON RAILS
CSCI 5448 Fall 2012 Presentation
Prashanth Mannar
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Contents in this Presentation
OUTLINE
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Outline
Ruby What and Why
Rails What, Why and Features
More on RoR Active Records, Action Pack,
CRUD, Migrations
Advantages
Disadvantages
Conclusion Summary, References, Books and
Tutorials
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What and why
RUBY
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What is RUBY?
An Object oriented, Open source
programming language
Developed by Yukihiro Matsumoto in the
1990s.
A blend of Matz favourite languages - Perl,
Smalltalk, Eiffel, Ada, and Lisp
Available for Windows, Mac OS, Unix/Linux,
Java, .NET and Android.
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RUBY Why?
According to Matz, Ruby is productive and fun
because it was designed on following principles
Principle of Conciseness
short, concise code
Principle of Consistency
a small set of rules covers the whole Ruby
language
Principle of Flexibility
should not restrict the flow of human
thought
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RUBY Syntax features
Whitespace is not significant (unlike Python)
Statements separated by semicolons or
carriage returns
Statement can span a newline
Parentheses can often be omitted
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What, why and features
RAILS
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What is RAILS?
An Open-source full stack web application
framework for Ruby.
David Heinemeier Hansson extracted Ruby on
Rails from his work on Basecamp, a project
management tool by 37signals.
Open source and free. Growing community
since 2004.
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RAILS Why?
a lot less code
a lot less configuration data
bringing up basic functionality quickly
building out new functionality incrementally
integrated testing
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RAILS Features (1)
Can be used in multiple environments
Development, testing, production
Rails embraces test-driven development
Unit testing, Functional testing, Integration testing
Multiple database support
Oracle, DB2, SQL Server, MySQL, PostgreSQL, SQLite
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RAILS Features (2)
DRY principal
Generate boilerplate code
Full stack MVC Framework
The Framework provides all three MVC layers
Convention over Configuration
No XML Configuration files
Scaffolding
Automatically creates a full set of CRUD operations
and views on any database table.
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RAILS MVC
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ActiveRecords, Action Pack, CRUD, Migrations
MORE ON ROR
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Active Records (1)
Database Wrapping instead of Database
Mapping
Each active record object represents a row in a
table
Each record object has CRUD methods for
database access
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Active Records (2)
Adds attributes automatically, based on the
columns in the database
Adds relational management through a
custom internal language
Naming convention allow database to discover
specific fields
Schema migration baked in Rails
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Action Pack (1)
Bundles both views and controllers
The view and controller parts of MVC are
pretty intimate
The controller supplies data to the view
The controller receives events from the pages
generated by the views
Rails provides a clear separation for control
and presentation logic
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Action Pack Views
Creating either all or part of a page to be displayed in a
browser
Dynamic content is generated by templates
rhtml
Embeds snippets of Ruby code within the views HTML
rxml
Lets you construct XML documents using Ruby code
The structure of the generated XML will automatically follow that
of the code
rjs
Allows you to create JavaScript fragments on the server which are
to be executed on the browser
Great for creating dynamic Ajax interfaces
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Action Pack Controller
Coordinates the interaction between the user, the views,
and the model
Rails handles most of this interaction behind the scenes
You only need to add the application-level functionality
Other responsibilities
Routing external requests to internal actions
Managing caching
Give applications orders-of-magnitude performance boosts
Managing helper modules
Extend the capabilities of the view templates without bulking up their
code
Managing sessions
Giving users the impression of ongoing interaction with the
applications
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CRUD
Create Read Update Delete
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CRUD Create (1)
Create row by creating object
an_order = Order.new an_order = Order.new(
an_order.name = Dave Thomas :name => Dave Thomas,
an_order.address = 122 Main :address => 122 Main,
an_order.phone = 2125551212 :phone => 2125551212 )
an_order.save an_order.save
Order.new do |o|
Note: We didnt need to
o.name = Dave Thomas
set a primary key. Rails
o.address = 122 Main
assumes id is primary key
o.phone = 2125551212
and set autoincrement
o.save
end
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CRUD Create (2)
Can also use create method
Creates a new object and saves it
Takes a hash or an array of hashes
an_order = Order.create(
[ { :name => Dave Thomas,
:address => 122 Main,
an_order = Order.create( :phone => 2125551212
:name => Dave Thomas, },
:address => 122 Main, { :name => Another Name,
:phone => 2125551212 ) :address => blah,
:phone => 1234567890
}])
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CRUD Read (1)
We need to specify which rows we want
Rails will return objects containing the data from those rows in the
database
Use the find method with one or more primary keys
an_order = Order.find(27)
product_list = Order.find(params[product_list])
find() will throw a RecordNotFound exception if any of the
requested primary keys cannot be found
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CRUD Read (2)
find() also has other options
can pass :all or :first along with other parameters
:conditions => name = Dave
corresponds to WHERE clause
:order => name
corresponds to ORDER BY clause
:limit => pagesize
corresponds to LIMIT
:offset => pagenum * pagesize
use in connection with :limit to step through query results
an_order = Order.find(:first,
:conditions => name = Dave Thomas)
orders = Order.find(:all,
:conditions => name = Dave,
:order => pay_type, shipped_at DESC,
:limit => 10)
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CRUD Read (3)
Allowing for externally generated parameters
pname = params[:name]
orders = Order.find(:all,
:conditions => [name = ?, pname])
orders = Order.find(:all,
:conditions => [name = :name,
{:name => pname}])
Can also write your own SQL
orders = Orders.find_by_sql(select * from orders)
single parameter - SQL string
May also be an array where first element is SQL with place holders. The rest is
a list of values or hash
Nice for hard queries or performance
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CRUD Update (1)
Simple
order = Order.find(123)
find the row or rows using find
order.name = Fred
update necessary fields
order.save
save
Also works with an array for multiple update
orders = Order.find(:all, :conditions => name like Dave%)
orders[0].name = Fred
etc.
May also use update() or update_all()
order = Order.update(123, :name => F, :address => blah)
finds, updates, saves, and returns object
result = Order.update_all(set clause, where clause)
returns number of rows updated
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CRUD Delete (1)
delete & delete_all
Order.delete(123)
Order.delete([1,2,3,4])
Order.delete_all([price > ?, maxprice])
destroy & destroy_all
order.find(123)
order.destroy
Order.destroy_all([price > ?, maxprice])
destroy and destroy_all ensure that ActiveRecord callback and
validation functions are invoked
preferred methods
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Migrations (1)
Rails is set up to encourage agile development
always making changes
even to the database
To support this, Rails provides a mechanism to set up and
modify the database
Goal 1: Apply only those changes necessary to move a
database from version x to version y
Goal 2: Shield the developer from the specific
implementation details of the underlying database
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Migrations (2)
Migration skeleton files are created every time you
generate a model
contained in db/migrate
Run the migration using rake
rake db:migrate
Migration files have a sequence number
acts as a version number
apply all migrations with sequence number greater than
the database version
Can pick a specific version
rake db:migrate VERSION=12
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Migration Methods
create_table
accepts a table name and a ruby block
add_column and remove_column
accepts table name and column name
and column type if adding a column
rename_column
accepts table name, column name, new column name
change_column
accepts table name, column name, new type
drop_table
accepts table name
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Pros and Cons
ADVANTAGES AND
DISADVANTAGES
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Disadvantages
No big corporate backer
Very few expert Ruby programmers, and universities
and TAFEs have not picked it up
Runs slowly (Java ~ 5 times faster but Ruby may be
improved by new VM - YARV)
Poor editor support and very slow debugger
No clustering, failover
No two-phase commit
Does not support compound primary keys
Internationalization support is weak
No off-the-shelf reporting tool
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Advantages
Standard directory structure for source
Can build prototype very quickly
Can add to and change prototype easily
Can generate scaffolding, if app is more complex,
and build on this
Very powerful, high-level commands
Ruby has great short-hand code for common
patterns, eg the Value Object
Built in testing, migration, and some version control
Does not constrain the programmer like other
frameworks
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Reference and Learning Materials
CONCLUSION
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Points to noted
Can only be used for web-based, specifically
HTML-based, applications
Designed for small to medium CRUD-based
applications
Cross-platform
Large tools and software base
Ruby and Rails are each very powerful in their
own right.
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References
The Ruby Programming Language - David
Flanagan and Yukihiro Matsumoto
Engineering Long Lasting Software - Armando
Fox and David Patterson
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_on_Rails
http://www.ruby-lang.org/en/
http://rubyonrails.org/
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Books
The Ruby Programming Language - David Flanagan and Yukihiro
Matsumoto
Ruby on Rails Bible - Timothy Fishe
Agile Web Development with Rails - Sam Ruby, Dave Thomas and David
Heinemeier Hansson
Ruby on Rails : Up and Running
Online Resources
http://ruby.railstutorial.org/
http://www.ruby-doc.org/
http://www.digitalmediaminute.com/article/1816/top-ruby-on-rails-
tutorials
Rails mailing list
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David Heinemeier Hansson (Ruby on Rails creator) explained, "Once
you've tried developing a substantial application in Java or PHP or C# or
whatever," he says, "the difference in Rails will be readily apparent. You
gotta feel the hurt before you can appreciate the cure."
FROM THE CREATOR
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