Customer Rating: 
Summary: This is how technical books should be, a reall page turner
Comment: OK, I'm coming to rails late. I've played with Ruby on and off for about a year. I though it was a bit of a "kitchen sink" language until I got a good kick in the head by Neil Ford.
So this week I picked up this book (version 2) and I started reading it. It is, as far as technical books go, a page turner.
It gives a basic overview and the walks through an example as a tutorial.
I recommend you learn a little Ruby first (not necessary but makes working through the examples more focused on Rails rather than Ruby and Rails).
If you want to learn about Ruby on Rails and get an idea of what web development should be, read this book. THEN, the next time you need to start working on a site for a customer, sit down with them and start developing the site in real-time.
If they don't like Ruby, call it an "executable requirements description". Eventually, they might even think that the solution is good as is. If not, you still have a better explanation of where to go.
After Rails, I'm going back to RSpec and story tests and examine the maturity of developing a Ruby solution using TDD. I'm pretty sure it's already being done, so I just need to get on that learning curve.
This is a GREAT book. Get it, read it, TYPE in the examples - ok maybe download the CSS's and the style-sheet.
WARNING: the material related to OS X installation is a bit out of date. Use macports and install mysql, rb-mysql, rails, ruby (and I'm probably forgetting something), change your path to point to where that stuff got installed (probably /opt/local/bin/) and you'll be good to go - once you get mysql setup. There are some chicken scratchings here: http://schuchert.wikispaces.com/Ruby.RailsConfiguration.OSX, or do a google search. It'll be October 2008 before I actually put up good details, but it'll happen.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Great Book - But Wait to Buy
Comment: This is THE book for Rails. Top notch...only WAIT to buy it. As others have said, there is a new edition coming out soon that covers Rails 2.0. Of course...if you can't wait, go to the publisher's web page. They are selling copies of this edition for 50% off, while supplies last. But, some of the code in this book will not work anymore in Rails 2.0. Still, a great book and well worth it even for a quick introduction to the Rails world while you wait for the new edition. Once it's updated, though, for sure, GO FOR IT!
Customer Rating:
Summary: seriously, this is the best technical textbook I've ever read
Comment: Not only is there a great framework to this textbook will introduce you to, but this is written in the perfect balance of interesting style and serious technical content along with compelling example that I've ever seen in any book. I give this book my very highest recommendation and I give the rails framework five stars as well for being an excellent easy to use and very functional framework.
This book seems to cover everything that I'm interested in and is able to adapt to different levels of knowledge that I'm able to arrive at in programming in Ruby language. The book does not insult the reader and while it challenges the reader doesn't over challenge or overwhelm any point. I can only recommend it for my particular demographic of rails newbies, but I think this book will work very well for anyone else who might be more familiar with Ruby and the rails framework.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Great book, wish it was Rails 2.0
Comment: This book is a great intro to Rails, very readable and easy to understand. It also seems fairly comprehensive. The only downside to this book is that it's not Rails 2.0, so a number of the examples are outdated or don't work with the latest versions of Rails (there were significant changes). I was taking a class in Ruby on Rails, and since we were using Rails 2.0, we had to get "The Rails Way" which covers Rails 2.0 but sucks in comparison to this book. "The Rails Way" is a good book for learning Rails if you already know Rails.
Customer Rating:
Summary: I recommend it
Comment: I love the framework, the Agile philosophy and I love how the book is structured: straightforward, practical, easy to follow, programmer-oriented.
I truly recommend it for anyone willing to begin in the Rails universe.
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