The document discusses the author's journey over 12 months learning to code as a new Ruby developer. It covers setting up a development environment, learning Ruby and Rails through online tutorials, books, and pairing with experienced developers. The author notes that writing code often involves frustration from things not working at first but can lead to euphoria when solved, and emphasizes the importance of never stopping to learn, not being afraid to ask for help, and having passion.

1. Learning To Code
The adventures, frustrations and triumphs of a newbie Ruby developer
!
by
!
Angela Ebirim

2. “Follow the Yellow Brick Road,
Angela!”
Intro:
Hello, My name
is Angela and I’m
a newbie Ruby
dev
I’ve been a
newbie dev for
over 12 months

3. My trusty companion
Toto

4. and the others…
Tin man The Lion The Scarecrow
Self-beliefPassion Intellect

5. And so we begin!

6. Setting up your dev
environment
• What’s RVM?
• Git anyone?
• Which editor to use?
• Install Ruby
• What is Rails ?
• RubyMine
• VIM
• Sublime
• Rubygems
• Virtual Machine
• Command line
• Bugs
• Google it
• Stack Overflow
• source code repository

7. Learning Ruby & Rails
• Online tutorials e.g. CodeSchool, RailsCasts
• Books e.g. Pickaxe
• Rails Girls
• CodeCraft Academy
• Pairing with an experienced developer
• Finding a mentor
• Practice, practice, practice!

8. Writing code
• Most of the time your program won’t work
• Can take you from depths of despair to euphoria in 5 ms
• Frustrating - 2 steps forward, 1 step back
• Teaches you to ask better questions
• Collaborative - Rubygems
• Extremely creative - a million routes to a destination

9. Conclusion
• Never stop learning
• Not about the destination, it’s about the journey
• Never be afraid to say “I don’t know” and ask for help
• Don’t be afraid to make mistakes
• Get people to want to help you by doing your homework
• Have self-belief
• Stay focused
• Attention to detail
• Passion for building and breaking things

10. My Emerald City!
To be a competent developer

11. Thank you
Angela Ebirim
https://github.com/trekr5