Ruby Ireland P2PU study group

[José Domínguez]

After a discussion on irc today we are tempted to open a study group
for Ruby at http://p2pu.org/ focusing mainly in beginners now, and
seeing how the community evolves.

I'll be happy to organise the group if we get at least 3 mentors.
Oisin has volunteered for a mentor position so we will need another 2
(or more). Anyone up for it? Please reply to this thread if you are
either interested in being a mentor or in joining the group.

These groups can be managed synchronously and asynchronously so you
don't have to be in Dublin to join in. We can use irc, skype or any
other communication techniques. We might also meet in person, but
meetups don't have to happen in Dublin exclusively. Group members can
organise their own meetups too.

Let us know what you guys think!

cheers,
José

[Richard Conroy]

I like it, just getting involved in some similar things in London.

Interested in Joining, sign me up.

2012/1/17 José Domínguez <jjdoming...@gmail.com>

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[José Domínguez]

Hey Richard, you signing up as a mentor, right?

cheers,
José

[Mark Finlay]

As a beginner Rubyist a local study group is exactly what I would love to have access to.

Mark

2012/1/17 José Domínguez <jjdoming...@gmail.com>

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[Richard Conroy]

Bit of column A, bit of column B.

My experience in Ruby is a bit spikey atm. Hoping to round it out, and launch a few personal learning projects, compound some essential skills into muscle memory.

Was more into the peering bit. But I can get absolute beginners off the ground (have non-ruby background in tech training) and I have decent Ruby on Windows experience.

regards,

Richard

2012/1/17 José Domínguez <jjdoming...@gmail.com>

[Jivan]

this sounds great - i'd be a beginner and not a mentor!!!

 

despite difficulties all term in my RoR course, i managed to get up to speed.  however, we ended up having a stinker of an exam last saturday (format completely changed without our being told) so i failed it.  (a first for me in exams...)

looking forward to being mentored - thanks to all!

 

jivan

 

2012/1/17 Richard Conroy <richard...@gmail.com>

[Richard Conroy]

What course is this?

Just curious. An 'exam' doesn't seem to be the most appropriate way to either instruct or assess someones Rails skills.

[Jivan]

hi richard,

 

it's a cloud computing course in national college of ireland.  interesting comment about exams!  many of my colleagues would agree with you especially after saturday's farce!  btw, we also did a project.

regards,

[Declan McGrath]

Great initiative guys. Won't have time at the moment to help on mentoring - which I really regret - but will do anything I can to help support it.

I think it's just about the best thing we can do at the moment to help people with Ruby!

Dec

[Richard Conroy]

Ah, I forgot the NCI courses. Fair play for running courses with some modern skill sets, but you teach Rails with lots of projects. Make them small to do more, but it is essential to repeat certain basics to make sure they get settled in.

If you need a crash course in Ruby Fundamentals, you could give http://ruby.learncodethehardway.com - I like its approach, especially for beginners, and its emphasis on drill exercises to make lessons take hold. 

[Tom Eustace]

Sounds great.  My issue with learning ruby has been I don't get to practice much and free time is nearly non existent at the moment (it's a girl).  Would it be an option to use these sessions to work on a project, which could be worked on in increments and hosted on github or similar. This would allow members who miss a session to track the project updates.  Of course the project commits would need to be well documented.  I'm sure the community could come up with some project ideas that would cover a lot, may end up with something useful, which would be nice.

[Steven Wilkin]

Thanks for getting the ball rolling with this one Jose.

This seems to be in the same spirit as what we are trying to achieve
with the newly formed BelfastRuby[1] so I've forwarded your mail onto
the list[2].

Like a lot of the other members I'd love to help out on the mentoring
side but I've spread myself very thin at the moment.

Anything I can do just give me a shout.

Steve

[1] http://belfastruby.com/
[2] http://groups.google.com/group/belfastruby

On Jan 17, 1:29 pm, José Domínguez <jjdominguezve...@gmail.com> wrote:
> After a discussion on irc today we are tempted to open a study group

> for Ruby athttp://p2pu.org/focusing mainly in beginners now, and

[Frank Murphy]

On 17/01/12 21:54, Richard Conroy wrote:
> Ah, I forgot the NCI courses. Fair play for running courses with some
> modern skill sets, but you teach Rails with lots of projects. Make them
> small to do more, but it is essential to repeat certain basics to make
> sure they get settled in.

Would P2PU be suitable for a total beginner?

>
> If you need a crash course in Ruby Fundamentals, you could give
> http://ruby.learncodethehardway.com - I like its approach, especially
> for beginners, and its emphasis on drill exercises to make lessons take
> hold.
>

Thanks for this link. will have a look.

--
Regards,

Frank Murphy
UTF_8 Encoded

[José Domínguez]

Hi all,

The group can be used for everything you guys can come up with. Even
subgroups can be formed if some people want to work on different
projects. It's very open and flexible. And yes, it would be suitable
for total beginners but just take into account that this is a study
group; no one is going to chase others up to get stuff done. You do it
if you want, it's your responsibility.

So far we only have 1 committed mentor (and another 2 people that
would commit if they had more time). We'd need another two mentors to
get it going.

cheers,
José

[José Domínguez]

So guys, are we letting this die off or people still up for it?

cheers,
José

2012/1/18 José Domínguez <jjdoming...@gmail.com>:

[Jivan]

Hope this doesn't die off completely...

 

As a "receptor" of mentoring, I would interested once I finish the rest of my course (end May) as I don't think we'll be doing RoR the next semester.

 

Regards,

 

Jivan

2012/1/21 José Domínguez <jjdoming...@gmail.com>

[Oisin Hurley]

> So guys, are we letting this die off or people still up for it?

It's difficult to commit time at the best of times, I guess :)

Rather than let things disappear completely and disappoint the people
on the mailing list that are keen to get started, do you think perhaps
we could knock together a ruby working night that's aimed at the
beginners, i.e. it is a task-driven session, with a structure, not a
freeform (although the more advanced beginner could indeed operate in
the session, using the supervisors for guidance/questions etc).
Depending on time frame, I can volunteer to do some materials
construction for Ruby web apps, although I won't touch Rails because
it's too damn monstrous and busy for beginners (IMHO) - it'll be
Sinatra/Padrino all the way :)

--oh

[José Domínguez]

I would be up for that, being a ruby beginner myself, but the problem
that we were trying to solve with the online interaction was not
having to be in one place at one fixed time but being able to catch up
whenever you have the time (limited time).

What I had in mind for p2pu was something like: each fortnight read 4
chapters of the 'learn ruby the hard way' book. Mentors come up with
exercises that are different to the ones in the book, and those are
the ones that actually allow you to go forward. mentors are also there
to reply to questions, asynchronously. We could also meet once or
twice a month to work on the exercises. The exercises should build up
towards a project, that should start as soon as people are getting
comfortable with the language.

But whatever works for you guys, I'd go with... much better than
letting it disappear.

cheers,
José

[Ciaran Archer]

Hi all

I have 3 people who are beginning Ruby development (I include myself
in that) that would like take part as students. Our company is making
the transition to Ruby and as such we'd ultimately be doing a lot of
web development, using Padrino / Sinatra. However, I'd like us all to
have a good grasp of Ruby basics first :)

Ideally from our point of view, we'd like to be able to read and work
on exercises during the week as Jose suggested, and then if we could
get some feedback to questions, and such from the mentors
asynchronously, or at the next Ruby meetup that would be great.

I guess as we become more expert we'd like to contribute more back
into the community as a whole, I'd even think about mentoring :)

I guess the next question is - where do we take it from here? :)

Cheers,
Ciaran

Ideally from our point of view, we'd like to be able to read and work
on exercises during the week as Jose suggested, and then if we could
get some feedback to questions, and such from the mentors
asynchronously, or at the next Ruby meetup that would be great.

On Jan 22, 3:17 pm, José Domínguez <jjdominguezve...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I would be up for that, being a ruby beginner myself, but the problem
> that we were trying to solve with the online interaction was not
> having to be in one place at one fixed time but being able to catch up
> whenever you have the time (limited time).
>
> What I had in mind for p2pu was something like: each fortnight read 4
> chapters of the 'learn ruby the hard way' book. Mentors come up with
> exercises that are different to the ones in the book, and those are
> the ones that actually allow you to go forward. mentors are also there
> to reply to questions, asynchronously. We could also meet once or
> twice a month to work on the exercises. The exercises should build up
> towards a project, that should start as soon as people are getting
> comfortable with the language.
>
> But whatever works for you guys, I'd go with... much better than
> letting it disappear.
>
> cheers,
> José
>

[Oisin Hurley]

I forgot about the online interaction bit :)

> What I had in mind for p2pu was something like: each fortnight read 4
> chapters of the 'learn ruby the hard way' book. Mentors come up with
> exercises that are different to the ones in the book, and those are
> the ones that actually allow you to go forward. mentors are also there
> to reply to questions, asynchronously. We could also meet once or
> twice a month to work on the exercises. The exercises should build up
> towards a project, that should start as soon as people are getting
> comfortable with the language.

That sounds cool.

--oh

[Frank Murphy]

On 22/01/12 15:17, Jos� Dom�nguez wrote:
> I would be up for that, being a ruby beginner myself, but the problem
> that we were trying to solve with the online interaction was not
> having to be in one place at one fixed time but being able to catch up
> whenever you have the time (limited time).
>

Though in Waterford City,
count me in as a newb.
I can get the bus up as\when.

[José Domínguez]

OK guys, so if everybody is happy then I can open a study group for
'learn ruby the hard way" http://ruby.learncodethehardway.org/book/
- 6 chapters(or exercises) a fortnight
- mentors will come up with some form of assessment (but this is
still a peer to peer study group!)
- there's a possibility to meet up (once a month) but not mandatory
(meeting will make more sense when working on projects?)
- we will correct course as we go (we can organise quick intro
sessions to stuff like testing, CI, and so on)

We should be done in about 4 months and by then we can move on to the
padrinos and sinatras OR do we want to spawn a web group after the
first month or so? should we play it by ear?

A final question for mentors... shall we open the group to people
outside of the ruby.ie community?
in p2pu there are two ways of being involved in a course: following or
participating; first one are pretty much lurkers, and the second type
would be full participants. We don't have to accept all requests for
participation so we can keep it local-ish (Ireland). Global is way
cooler but potentially more work for mentors, so better keep it local?

cheers,
José

PS: I will open a ruby ireland account in p2pu if we go ahead.

On 23 January 2012 18:46, Frank Murphy <fran...@gmail.com> wrote:

[glen...@gmail.com]

This sounds really good , count me in please

[Mark Finlay]

Great stuff guys,

I'd vote for a session on TDD at some stage.

Thanks, Mark

[José Domínguez]

Anyone had a look at the book? not sure it's 'study group' material:
http://ruby.learncodethehardway.org/book/intro.html
It seems to have been written for individual use. Any other resources
we could consider?

cheers,
José

[Richard Conroy]

Working through it at the moment. I was impressed at how it covered everything. It talks about correct gemspecing and project structures, as well as intros to TDD. For an intro level book, it covers everything at a broad level - giving you good foundation and advancing their muscle memory skills. 

The first chapter is non-religious - editor setup and verifying it is working for all OSes. This is an area where a lot of beginners get hung up on IME.

I think it would be useful for every participant to complete the exercises on their own before participating in a mentoring program.

2012/1/23 José Domínguez <jjdoming...@gmail.com>

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[Oisin Hurley]

These are meant to be good options

http://www.amazon.com/Beginning-Ruby-Professional-Peter-Cooper/dp/1430223634/ref=dp_ob_title_bk

http://www.amazon.com/Programming-Ruby-1-9-Pragmatic-Programmers/dp/1934356085/ref=pd_sim_b_5

[José Domínguez]

one of the requisites of P2PU is that materials have to be freely
available. There is an online copy of the pragmatic's pickaxe, first
edition I think, but will be very outdated, right?
We can organise this outside P2PU too (just a google group for any
book we choose?).

Would people be happy to buy a book?

cheers,
José

[Frank Murphy]

On 24/01/12 11:54, Jos� Dom�nguez wrote:
> one of the requisites of P2PU is that materials have to be freely
> available. There is an online copy of the pragmatic's pickaxe, first
> edition I think, but will be very outdated, right?
> We can organise this outside P2PU too (just a google group for any
> book we choose?).

Free is afforadable.

>
> Would people be happy to buy a book?
>

Depends on price, and if eBook is available.
Though I do have a Safari a\c.

[Richard Conroy]

I *like* Peter Coopers Beginning Ruby book, but 'general' ruby texts tend to divide the community. The Free Pickaxe book is too out of date.

*reading* books doesn't tend to fire the motivation as much as completing exercises, mini-projects and not-so-mini-projects. 

There are some really good Ruby projects out there like Ruby Koans and Project Euler which teach by example. I like LRTHW for the same reason, and also because it is basic enough for anyone to follow through, and it means that as a mentor, you can put a baseline on a students ability if they have completed it. 

2012/1/24 José Domínguez <jjdoming...@gmail.com>

[José Domínguez]

I forgot about ruby koans... and like the idea.

What about:
- Participants are asked to follow the 'hard way' book on their own.
As a pre-requisite you have to have completed up to Exercise 10 of the
book to sign up for the course (submit solutions).
- At the same time they are asked to go through Ruby Koans in pairs
(social aspect to the group here)
- On finishing the Koans, they will have to think about a pet
project (this can be a web project with sinatra/padrino too). It's
better if you work in what you want, not a given project. Can be in
groups too.

Mentors will be there to help out and assess if participants are ready
for a project and the scope of the project. Participants can use any
additional reading materials they can get their hands on.

Any thoughts?

cheers,
José

[Frank Murphy]

On 24/01/12 12:36, Jos� Dom�nguez wrote:
> I forgot about ruby koans... and like the idea.
>
> What about:
> - Participants are asked to follow the 'hard way' book on their own.
> As a pre-requisite you have to have completed up to Exercise 10 of the
> book to sign up for the course (submit solutions).

Does platform used matter?
As I'm on Fedora flavour.

[Richard Conroy]

On Tue, Jan 24, 2012 at 12:42 PM, Frank Murphy <fran...@gmail.com> wrote:

Does platform used matter?
As I'm on Fedora flavour.

Not for LRTHW - it spends a good bit of time priming the end user for the terminal on Windows, OSX & Linux, also goes into good details on editor selection in a non-religious manner. it also recommends that you get comfortable with your shell.

There is also the CLI Crash course on the same site.

 

[Richard Conroy]

2012/1/24 José Domínguez <jjdoming...@gmail.com>

 - Participants are asked to follow the 'hard way' book on their own.
As a pre-requisite you have to have completed up to Exercise 10 of the
book to sign up for the course (submit solutions).

 

Mentors will be there to help out and assess if participants are ready

for a project and the scope of the project. Participants can use any
additional reading materials they can get their hands on.

Any thoughts?

I am not familiar with any mandatory structure imposed by the P2PU site, but at minimum I would expect that anyone looking for me as a mentor should complete ALL of LRTHW as a minimum. It is not hard, and dedicated students have been known to complete its sister book for python in 2 evenings. 

'

[Frank Murphy]

On 24/01/12 13:53, Richard Conroy wrote:

>
> I am not familiar with any mandatory structure imposed by the P2PU site,
> but at minimum I would expect that anyone looking for me as a mentor
> should complete ALL of LRTHW as a minimum.

Will try.

It is not hard, and dedicated
> students have been known to complete its sister book for python in 2
> evenings.
> '
>

Is this online, also need to do Python?

[Richard Conroy]

On Tue, Jan 24, 2012 at 2:02 PM, Frank Murphy <fran...@gmail.com> wrote:

 It is not hard, and dedicated

students have been known to complete its sister book for python in 2
evenings.
'

Is this online, also need to do Python?

No. Learn Python the Hard Way was the original book in 'The Hard Way' series that was released free about 1-2 years ago. The format was successful, and the format was copied for Ruby (translating code examples etc.).

The books can be freely viewed on line, or PDF/epub versions can be purchased cheaply.

There is a lot more LPTHW testimonials about, and I believe the time is comparable to how quickly you can progress through the examples. 

I find that the books are particularly well aimed at the diligent novice - it removes all of the frustrating obstacles that normally hit the newcomer (code examples not compiling, doesn't work on their system, assumptions of prior knowledge) and forces knowledge transfer through drills.

 

[Frank Murphy]

On 24/01/12 14:17, Richard Conroy wrote:
> Learn Python the Hard Way

I forget to check the web at times.
But it is cheap.

http://learnpythonthehardway.org/

[rudedoc]

I think LRTHW could be ok for a group sessions. Individuals cover the
book content as a minimum. The mentors would then expand further on
the things covered in the Extra Credit sections, maybe examine some
"in the wild" examples found in gems, talk about what best practice
would be and how to avoid trouble.

Would part 1 of Eloquent Ruby be too much for this particular venture?

Mark

On Jan 23, 10:59 pm, José Domínguez <jjdominguezve...@gmail.com>
wrote:

> Anyone had a look at the book? not sure it's 'study group' material:http://ruby.learncodethehardway.org/book/intro.html
> It seems to have been written for individual use. Any other resources
> we could consider?
>
> cheers,
> José
>

> On 23 January 2012 21:08, Mark Finlay <m...@betbambury.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> > Great stuff guys,
>
> > I'd vote for a session on TDD at some stage.
>
> > Thanks, Mark
>

> > On 23 January 2012 20:30, <glenfl...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >> This sounds really good , count me in please
>

> >> On , José Domínguez <jjdominguezve...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> > OK guys, so if everybody is happy then I can open a study group for
>
> >> > 'learn ruby the hard way"http://ruby.learncodethehardway.org/book/
>
> >> >  - 6 chapters(or exercises) a fortnight
>
> >> >  - mentors will come up with some form of assessment (but this is
>
> >> > still a peer to peer study group!)
>
> >> >  - there's a possibility to meet up (once a month) but not mandatory
>
> >> > (meeting will make more sense when working on projects?)
>
> >> >  - we will correct course as we go (we can organise quick intro
>
> >> > sessions to stuff like testing, CI, and so on)
>
> >> > We should be done in about 4 months and by then we can move on to the
>
> >> > padrinos and sinatras OR do we want to spawn a web group after the
>
> >> > first month or so? should we play it by ear?
>
> >> > A final question for mentors... shall we open the group to people
>
> >> > outside of the ruby.ie community?
>
> >> > in p2pu there are two ways of being involved in a course: following or
>
> >> > participating; first one are pretty much lurkers, and the second type
>
> >> > would be full participants. We don't have to accept all requests for
>
> >> > participation so we can keep it local-ish (Ireland). Global is way
>
> >> > cooler but potentially more work for mentors, so better keep it local?
>
> >> > cheers,
>
> >> > José
>
> >> > PS: I will open a ruby ireland account in p2pu if we go ahead.
>

[Richard Conroy]

On Thu, Jan 26, 2012 at 12:11 AM, rudedoc <finla...@gmail.com> wrote:

Would part 1 of Eloquent Ruby be too much for this particular venture?

+1

I like it. Eloquent Ruby answers some of the 'why?' questions quite well. It does it better without throwing people into needless detail. It puts a larger context onto something like LRTHW which is exercise driven.

[rudedoc]

Frank,

Did the p2pu start?

I got no word about it.

Thanks, Mark

[José Domínguez]

Hi guys, nope, it hasn't started yet, but we will get there soon.

cheers,
José

[Jakub Jarosz]

+1 for the beginner group

I like the idea of f2f meetings.

thanks,

Jakub 

[José Domínguez]

Guys, there is a Ruby study group starting up in P2PU:
http://p2pu.org/en/groups/learn-ruby/

As the idea of our own group never took off, I'd sign up for that if
you are interested. The course seems to start from Ruby installation
so should be good-ish for all levels. If anyone is interested on
taking this offline somehow at the meetups (or resurrecting project
nights!) I'd be happy to get involved.

cheers,
José

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[Jivan]

i'll keep it in mind!

jivan

2012/3/5 José Domínguez <jjdoming...@gmail.com>