Firstly, follow the steps at the Twitter Bootstrap for Rails post. Once you have it setup to meet your needs, just do the following on a field that requires a popover.

//in the js file
$('#user_username').popover()

//on the form
//ERB
<%= f.text_field :username, "data-content" => "This is a username", "data-title" => "Username" %>
//Or simple_form
<%= f.input :username, :input_html => {"data-content" => 'This is a username', "data-title" => 'Username'} %>

Which should show something like this:

Thanks,

Cameron Stitt

The twitter-bootstrap-rails gem allows you to easily install and generate the required files to implement the components. To install, follow the easy steps below:

gem 'twitter-bootstrap-rails'
bundle install
rails g bootstrap:install

You can then generate layouts and templates for resources. You can choose between a fixed and fluid layout. Read all about it at the Twitter Bootstrap site.

rails g bootstrap:layout application fixed
rails g bootstrap:themed [RESOURCE_NAME]

That is the basis of setting up Twitter Bootstrap for Rails. I now use this as my default layout when creating a new app as I takes away a lot of time that you would normally spend attempting to get some default styles prepared.

Thanks,

Cameron

Now that we have installed Ruby on Rails on Windows and you have created a few projects with Rails on Windows (I hope!), each post in this series will now describe a few features that can help you develop applications for Rails on Windows.

LDAP/AD Authentication

The best method of setting up LDAP/AD integration in a Rails app is to use the devise_ldap_authenticatable gem to your application. This is not a Windows only gem, but I personally found it to be the easiest way to setup LDAP/AD integration. This method will only work if you are also willing to use Devise. Follow the simple setup instructions on the gem’s GitHub site to use the default setting of LDAP authentication.

If you prefer to use AD integration rather than LDAP, the changes that may need to be made very much depend on your AD setup. You may need to change the “attribute” that it is fetching the username or password for. The other change you may need to make is to the “username” builder. This change may be required if you are having issues connecting with a username you know is correct.

Thin on Windows

Thin is a very fast web server for Rails. It is extremely easy to install on Windows:

gem install eventmachine --pre
gem install thin

At the time of writing the pre version of eventmachine was 1.0.0.beta.4.1.

These are just a few tips when working in a all Windows environment. If you have any questions, let me know!

Thanks,

Cameron

#In your Gemfile
gem 'simple_form'

#run in terminal
bundle install

rails g simple_form:install

#For your simple form!
<%= simple_form_for @user do |f| %>
  <%= f.input :username %>
  <%= f.input :password, :hint => "Must be 4-10 characters long" %>
  <%= f.input :age, :collection => 18..60 %>
  <%= f.button :submit %>
<% end %>

It provides some groovy inline validation and loads of cool features. If it sounds interesting check out the GitHub project or the RailsCast.

Revised Railscast (requires Pro Membership)
Original Railscast

Thanks,

Cameron

This post is the first in a series that will cover how to setup and install Ruby on Rails on the Windows operating system. I will also explain how to host a site on Windows as well as how to create a somewhat single sign-on environment which will allow you to create intranet sites (a big plus to .Net development for Windows based companies).

Installing Ruby on Rails

As is the case for most software on Windows, there is a one click installer for Ruby on Rails. It is simple to setup and can be found at the following site:

railsinstaller.org

Make sure you read the installation instructions as you go. You shouldn’t have any worries with the installation.

Installing Pik

Pik is a version manager for Ruby on Windows. It allows you to easily switch between multiple versions of Ruby as well as install gems to specific (or all) versions. For the following steps, make sure you open Command Prompt as an Administrator. Below are the steps you need to follow to install and setup Pik:

gem install pik

Once the gem has successfully installed, you need to install the pik executable to a location that is in your PATH environment variable. A good location is c:\bin. To add c:\bin to your PATH click Start -> Right click Computer -> Properties -> Advanced System Settings -> Environment Variables. Once you have a directory added to your PATH run the following command:

pik_install c:\bin

If you now run the pik command, it will add any version of Ruby that it can find to it’s list:

pik

Pik is now setup and ready to use. Some helpful commands can be found below:

#list ruby versions

pik list

#pik help

pik help commands

#add Ruby 1.9.3 to pik after installation through RubyInstaller

pik add c:\Ruby1.9.3\bin

#user Ruby 1.9.3

pik use 193

#install gem across all rubies

pik gem install sorcery

Pik is now installed and ready to go. Visit the Pik Github page for more info.

Installing DevKit

DevKit allows you to build C/C++ extensions for Ruby on Windows. RailsInstaller has initiated the setup process, however the below steps *may* need to be completed:

cd c:\RailsInstaller\DevKit

#review the list and ensure all rubies are added correctly

ruby dk.rb review

#if everything is okay, install

ruby dk.rb install

That’s it! For more information on DevKit visit their GitHub page.

What have we done?

From here, we are ready to begin developing our first Rails application. We have installed everything we need to be successful Ruby developers while still using Windows as our main Operating System. Hopefully you didn’t run into any issues!

Thanks,

Cameron

A few weeks ago, I friend of mine showed me LINQ to SQL and after 30 seconds of reading up on it I was hooked. Why hadn’t I seen this before? It has been in the .Net framework for some time as far as I can see. I suppose it was another one of those cases where you don’t notice it until you need it. That is one issue I do have with .Net, it has so many features and yet you may never even know half of the things that it is capable of. That’s a conversation for another day though. LINQ to SQL allows you to easily create objects that you can interact with which also includes features such as:

• Parent/Child entities
• Stored Procedure calling as methods
• Customisation and the ability to override all of the methods and classes
• and much more

To find out more on LINQ to SQL, I recommend reading the following series from Scott Gu’s blog.

Using LINQ to SQL (Part 1)

Until next time!

Cameron

Secondly, I have created a few new pages. I have created a Project page that contains information on the different types of projects that I am a part of. This includes open source projects as well as websites that I have completed for clients. The second page I have created is a contact form. Please feel free to go there and shoot me an email with any ideas for a blog post or even any ideas you have to make the blog work better.

Thanks,

Cameron

Here are a few screenshots from a new site I have recently completed. A link to the site is at the bottom of the post.

McMaster Refrigeration Site

Thanks,

Cameron

1. Rockhampton has a reasonably large (larger than many would think) Web industry
2. As Rockhampton is a regional town, many members of the Web crowd would have never been to one of the larger nationally or internationally run conferences
3. It would also give an opportunity for people to meet companies within CQ. Especially for students within the region.
4. Networking is something that can be hard to achieve when working with the Web. We are generally isolated people that tend to work within our teams and no further. This would give attendee’s an opportunity to mingle with the other bright minds within the region and share their knowledge and experience with each other.

Examples of topics I would expect the conference to cover are as follows:

• Management concepts for web based teams / projects
• Tips, tricks and concepts in regards to languages used for the web (eg. HTML5, CSS3 etc)
• Discussions on how to successfully manage a Web Server

I will be releasing more information about the concept and such at a later date as this is still very early stages. If you have any thoughts on the subject please comment below, send me an email or send me a message via twitter (@camstitt).

Thanks,

Cameron

Firstly, a little bit about Convergenius. The following is extracted from their site:

Convergenius works with leading enterprises in tackling their most difficult and unique organisational challenges. These challenges often relate to the lack of visibility over key business processes such as Risk and Hazard management, Work and Competency management, inadequate association of key Work Pack information through static document management and report writing capability and lack of visibility over Compliance Management.

The Convergenius project came to me with a design already in place that did not need to be modified to much. The majority of the work that needed to be completed was updating the content. I did however modify the navigation and width of the site to match the new content. Furthermore, I migrated the old design to use more CSS3 and therefore include progressive enhancement.

To view the site, follow the link below:

http://www.convergenius.com

Thanks,

Cameron