End of Week 5 @ Epicodus

Wow, time is flying by. I haven't had time to write down a new post (still don't). So here is my quick recap of the past two weeks:

Since my last post, I've come to understand Ruby a lot more. We devoted two full weeks to building apps with Ruby in a command-line interface. This basically means that there is no web-page for your user-interface. Your interface is in the command line, aka the "Terminal," as Mac users know it. 

Command-line interfaces are interesting because they do what you tell them in a bare-bones style (although you can do some interesting things like add colors, flashing cursors, and ASCII Art).

ASCII Art can be really simple...

...or really complicated.

Ruby is quite a beautiful language. Once you grasp the syntax and understand the concepts of object-oriented design, it becomes easier and intuitive to work with. I'm still not quite there, but I'm getting better every day. Hey, it's only been three weeks of Ruby.

Last week was devoted entirely to building Ruby apps with PostgreSQL, a structured query language that holds the information run through our Ruby methods in a database. From the first day, I was absolutely loving it. Postgres really brings out the power of the Ruby language, allowing you to store, update, delete, and merge information as you wish. Merging SQL tables can be a bit tricky to wrap your head around, but once you get them, it's very useful and exciting. 

Tomorrow we start ActiveRecord. The homework that I've watched so far at learnhowtoprogram.com has already shown me some of ActiveRecord's potential. I am excited to finish the homework and get started building some apps with ActiveRecord. 

So there's my rushed review of the last two weeks. I hope to dedicate at least two days per week to writing blog posts that have a little more thought and structure to them! Until next time, keep on coding...