Wyncode recently blogged a “top 10” list of Rails development resources, what would be on my list?
Getting started on OS X with MRI Ruby you typically need to install Xcode command line tools, homebrew and rvm (with JewelryBox) or rbenv. MRI Ruby (aka. CRuby, aka. yarv) is the de facto reference implementation written in C, though JRuby has gained a following in larger enterprises. Microsoft at one time supported development of Iron Ruby for .NET but it has failed to gain much following.
Emerging in part as a reaction against the complexity of Java EE, the Rails community has tended to favor lightweight text editors such as TextMate, and now Sublime Text, over more heavyweight IDEs such as Eclipse and Netbeans, though JetBrain’s Rubymine has had some success. Vim continues to be popular with rubyists, with projects like Hermes.
If you don’t want to setup and maintain a local development environment you can now simply rent an online environment from Cloud9 or Nitrous.io. Other essential online tools include shared code repositories like GitHub and Bitbucket and bug tracking/project management tools such as Pivotal Tracker, Assembla or CodeBaseHQ.
One of the strengths of Rails is it’s excellent community maintained documentation, both guides and apidocs. Another great API resource is devdocs.io.
For online learning Code School and Rails for Zombies is a popular beginner resource, and Confreaks is great for catching up with conference presentations. Ryan Bates stopped publishing RailsCasts a year ago but Avdi Grimm has stepped in with Ruby Tapas.
Finally, one of the most important ingredients of any programming ecosystem are the libraries: Ruby Toolbox is a great place for learning about available gems from Haml to Inherited Resource, from Nokogiri to Grape and ActiveAdmin.
I hope I’ve piqued your interest to look at any one of these.