Overview:
With the expanding business and competition, if you’re a programmer you need to be at the top of your game constantly. So, you need to sharpen your concepts and coding skills. In programming/development, coding is the most important part. You need to be good hands-on coder to get better opportunities. Here are a few tips to do better.
Alternative Framework
Although Rails is the dominant framework for Rubyist, it’s not the only one out there. You might be working on Rails every day, but you need to know how to work on alternative frameworks out there. In some cases, it is better to go with Sinatra, Grape or the plain old Rack application.
By learning all that is available and how to use them, you will have the ability to make smarter technology choices and incorporate non-Rail approaches in your Rail Application. You will also be able to mismatch your projects by diving them into smaller chunks and later on combining them to create one big application.
Knowing how the web works
It often happens, that Ruby web developers don’t have much idea about how the web works. That is because they often come from a non-technical or a non-IT background which means that they lack formal Computer Science Education.
If you are creating applications in Ruby you need to have knowledge of what happens when the website address is entered in the URL bar. Topics that are essential for working are TCP/IP, DNS system, HTTP protocol including Headers and Cookies.
You will also need to have the knowledge of internal mechanisms of the Internet. This will help you with debugging and optimizing your applications and also and you can also avoid possible security issues in your code.
UNIX
You should know how to get work done with just one window, which is the terminal window. It doesn’t matter if you’re a Mac or a Linux user, sooner or later you will have to use the terminal to perform one or the other task, on the server or locally. You can use an IDE such as RubyMine but this will not let you run it on the server to inspect the production system. UNIX commands are useful not only for navigating or moving files around, it also has a philosophy of small programs that can be combined together in order to perform larger tasks. By embracing this way of thinking about the software you are using will help you in writing a better code and programming in general too. There are quite a few resources available to learn Linux/Unix terminal.
Modern JavaScript and CSS
The web is changing. Earlier you might have been able to get off with the knowledge of simple JQuery but sooner or later you will have to embrace JavaScript to be a better programmer. In fact, even only pure JavaScript will not be enough. The times are changing and the need for client-side frameworks like Backbone, AngularJS and Ember are increasing. You can make your applications snappier, consume fewer resources and have better separation between UI and business logic by shifting some of the logic onto the client.
Along with JavaScript, the times have changed for CSS development as well. Its no longer possible to get away with writing your CSS from Scratch. It has become difficult with all the incompatible devices that are out there. The web has evolved to be much more mobile friendly and mobile devices tend to have tons of resolution and screen density combinations. You will have to learn to use all the different CSS frameworks. You can use Bootstrap or Foundation. Bootstrap will be better as it has incorporated lot of JavaScript components with libraries such as Angular UI to be used.
Start-up and Business Basics
Start-ups are the new trend and if you know how to write Ruby, there is a fat chance you will be creating one of them. At this stage it becomes important to understand the gibberish of management and you will need to impersonate a start-up owner.
Write Code every day
You need to continuously sharpen your skills. It will help you a lot write code every day and you will become a better developer gradually. It will help you catch up to your mistakes and increasing your speed in coding.
These are some of the tips that will help you in becoming a better Rubyist to Know More Information. This is not a complete list of everything you need to do but it is a start.