How to make a social network website

Rails
1

Hi, I’m a new programmer and I want to make a social network like
facebook or orkut.

I only know the basics of C and a bit of Objective-C (OOP). I know
nothing about web programming.

My question is what should I use, ruby on rails or python with django?
I know it is a ruby on rails group, so I know I have to expect the
good points on rails, but since I don’t know any of the 2 languages,
and neither anything on web programming, I’d like your opinion why
rails is better.

Also where should I start learning how to make my social network with
ruby on rails?
Any particular book, opencoursewares, or tutorials I could use?

I downloaded a book, “RailsSpace - Building a Social Networking
Website with Ruby on Rails”, but don’t know if it is good, and also it
requires some knowledge of HTML, which I don’t have.

Thank you for your time,
Rodrigo

2

On Wed, Apr 20, 2011 at 7:19 PM, Rodrigo R.
[email protected]wrote:

Hi, I’m a new programmer and I want to make a social network like
facebook or orkut.

Welcome to being a new programmer and I can see you have already set a
lofty
goal for yourself. It’s good to have ambition. :slight_smile:

I only know the basics of C and a bit of Objective-C (OOP). I know
nothing about web programming.

Understanding OOP is going to be key when learning Ruby and Ruby on
Rails.

My question is what should I use, ruby on rails or python with django?
I know it is a ruby on rails group, so I know I have to expect the
good points on rails, but since I don’t know any of the 2 languages,
and neither anything on web programming, I’d like your opinion why
rails is better.

Ruby and Ruby on Rails. It’s more OOP with a very active and
enthusiastic
user base. In my opinion it is definitely more popular. This is based on
my
very unscientific study of what jobs recruiters call me about.

Here is a great link where the author compares the two very well.
http://www.wikivs.com/wiki/Python_vs_Ruby

Also where should I start learning how to make my social network with
ruby on rails?
Any particular book, opencoursewares, or tutorials I could use?

I downloaded a book, “RailsSpace - Building a Social Networking
Website with Ruby on Rails”, but don’t know if it is good, and also it
requires some knowledge of HTML, which I don’t have.

That book will give you a good understanding of how to build a social
network with RoR. However, it will not get you the basics of web
programming
or give you a deeper dive into Ruby that you would get somewhere else.
You
do have to have some knowledge of HTML no matter what web programming
you
do. HTML is the basic markup language of the web and is ultimately the
final
output of any web program. You should definitely take the time to go
through
a tutorial, read a book, or take a class that will give you the
understanding of HTML.

My suggestion is that you learn about web programming in the following
order:

  1. HTML (with some CSS and Javascript)
  2. Ruby
  3. Ruby on Rails

You can replace 2 with any language you want to learn (Python, Java,
etc.)
and 3 with that language’s corresponding framework but you can never
replace
1.

Good luck in your learning and welcome again to programming!

B.

3

Thank you.

I had more answers at the Django group, but your answer was far more
superior than Djangos. When I asked there about python vs ruby they just
said it was a stupid question…

One more question, do you know any tutorial, book or class (video
classes
like opencourseware) that I can use to learn HTML?
One thing I did like about ruby on rails is that at first I found a book
specifically for what I wanted, didn’t have to keep looking for one part
at
each place to get the pieces together. Do you know if I can do that with
HTML? I mean, just one book or one tutorial.

Thank you again,
Rodrigo

4

Also, just out of curiosity, is ruby on rails just for web applications
or I
can build on desktop or mobile or anything else?

5

I have a mac, and I saw something about MacRuby, is it good? is it the
same
as any other way of programming for web with ruby on rails?

6

The Rails part of Ruby on Rails is a web framework so as such is
really only for web development.

Ruby however can do almost anything but you would have to pick a new
framework for desktop applications (such as GTK or wx or Fox or …)
and again for mobile development. Actually I don’t know of a mobile
framework for Ruby but I’m sure one exists (or is at least in alpha)

7

To start with HTML and CSS you’ll find excellent tutorials here:

teaching how to make clean and compliant programming
or also here

to Rails with indications on where to find Ruby tutorials here:

In this link, one of the tutorials teach you how to make a ‘Twitter’
clone.

I think you’ll be busy at least in the next six months and I wish you
All
The Best.

8

On 21 Apr 2011, at 16:58, Rodrigo R. [email protected] wrote:

I have a mac, and I saw something about MacRuby, is it good? is it the same as
any other way of programming for web with ruby on rails?

Macruby is an implementation of ruby (like jruby, rubinius etc). Last I
heard it was still pretty experimental

9

Frederick C. wrote in post #994350:

On 21 Apr 2011, at 16:58, Rodrigo R. [email protected] wrote:

I have a mac, and I saw something about MacRuby, is it good? is it the same as
any other way of programming for web with ruby on rails?

Macruby is an implementation of ruby (like jruby, rubinius etc). Last I
heard it was still pretty experimental

MacRuby is still “experimental,” in the sense it is still in beta. But,
they are nearing a 1.0 release. I have experimented with an earlier
version of MacRuby. It seemed pretty stable, and capable of producing
production ready applications even back then. They’ve made a ton of
progress since that time.

http://www.macruby.org/blog/2011/03/23/macruby010.html

MacRuby is also quite a bit more that just another Ruby implementation.
MacRuby is built on top of Objective-C, which means that all Ruby
objects are actually Objective-C objects. This means that MacRuby has
native access to all the Mac OS X frameworks that are available to
native Objective-C Mac applications.

http://www.macruby.org/documentation/overview.html

Another cool thing about MacRuby is that way back in version 0.5 they
added support for Ahead-of-time compilation via LLVM. On top of that
they also replaced Ruby 1.9 (YARV) thread system with native POSIX
threads in order get around the global interpreter lock and improve
performance on multi-core systems. Later, support for Grand Central
Dispatch was added for even greater support for concurrent programs.

http://www.macruby.org/blog/2009/10/07/macruby05b1.html
http://llvm.org/
http://developer.apple.com/technologies/mac/snowleopard/gcd.html

I realize that this was sort of a side-bar reply, but just wanted to
make sure you didn’t discount a very cool technology due to an overly
simplified, and somewhat uninformed, statement.

10

Hi Rodrigo,

It’s great to hear that you’re interested in building a social network website! Considering your programming background in C and Objective-C, both Ruby on Rails and Python with Django are popular web development frameworks that can help you achieve your goal.

Ruby on Rails (RoR) is known for its simplicity and convention over configuration approach, making it beginner-friendly and efficient for rapid development. It has a strong community and a wealth of resources available for learning. Python with Django is also a powerful framework with a vast ecosystem and excellent documentation.

Regarding your question, since you’re new to web programming and don’t have experience with either language, Ruby on Rails might be a good choice to start with due to its developer-friendly nature and the resources available for beginners.

For learning how to create a social network website with Ruby on Rails, I recommend checking out this informative article on how to build a social network website from scratch. It provides step-by-step guidance and valuable insights on building a social media website. While the article doesn’t specifically focus on Rails, the concepts discussed can be applied to your project.

Additionally, you mentioned a book called “RailsSpace - Building a Social Networking Website with Ruby on Rails.” Although I can’t provide a personal review of it, exploring the book can be a good starting point. However, keep in mind that you may need to acquire some basic knowledge of HTML to effectively work with web development frameworks like Ruby on Rails.

Best of luck with your social network website development journey! If you have any more questions or need further assistance, feel free to ask.

Happy coding!