Hands up who has look at Ruby on rails?

If you havent here is a 10 sec summary to get you started. Ruby on Rails inspects the database model and offers all the functionality to get, change, and save those model objects. Take a cat object in the database.

In ROR you would create a new cat:

@cat = Cat.new

Im going to give my cat a collar so it doesnt get fleas and give them to me.

@cat.collar = true;

Now Im going to make sure my cat (in the database ) is saved:

@cat.save

And if I ever want to find my cat with id of 1:

@cat = Cat.find(1)

Soooooo simple. Why cant flex access the objects in the database like this straight out of the box. Well now it kinda can. The part of Ruby on Rails that makes this all possible is called ActiveRecord. And the guys at WebOrb are in the process of adding the best bits of ActiveRecord to thier Flex data service. You will be able to inspect a database table >> generate some classes to include in your flex project >> and start making your own flex cats .

"if you were to put side-by-side a Rails developer and a Flex server developer tasked to come up with a similar solution for their respective environments, the Rails developer would be much further along in the same amount of time. The main reason is Rails does a lot more to get you started and then let's you stay super productive. There is no reason why Flex developers cannot enjoy the same."

Check out thier blog post for a better description: HERE 

After following alot of startups learning with many approaches to beta releases I have stumbled upon the worst example of how to release a beta. But first what I have seen. 

There seem to be three schools:

1. Release your beta early with less functionality….ride some marketing and hype and improve the functionality as you go
2. Release your beta late (seems to be 3/4 the way through dev cycle) and use the hype in market to get some interest for full release
3. Release your beta never make up your mind to leave the beta status little star in the top corner of your site forever. 

Well tonight I discovered the latest one which I really hope isnt a growing trend. http://blogwerx.com/ now seems to be accepting registrations (well somehow I managed to sign up) and you enter you newaccount after the obligitory email, and wow. Nothing work. And I mean nothing…sliders dont slide, buttons dont do anything….They could have posted a screen shot with hotspots for the same effect.

Realising there was alot of talk on this subject last year I wont press on, but it was just sad to see such a horrid experience. 

Sitting doing repetative stuff at 2.12am. Nothing worse? well yeah not really, but I gotta get some extra coin to keep the tax man at bay . 

One thing I thought I would share is how great my xmas present from my parents has been. They got me the Logitech G15 gaming keyboard.  And if nothing else (but there is more) the Macros rock. I have a key for in flex for adding getters and setters to private variables, thats one key!!!! I now have three profiles, because I have so many macros stored. One for gaming, one for developing and one for ods and ends. Man im starting to sound g33ky. Anyway, just a heads up if your xyz relations are after hints for a present I really recomend it, not only for gaming ;P but also developing

Making a macro is simple as hitting the Marco record button….typeing some stuff out (I higlighted the private var >> then copy >> the typed out getters and setters using the paste for var name minus the underscore and press the macro record button again. Boom! your done…getters and setters at the press of a button.

and it has a prudy screen that hooks into most games and itune etc…but thats just a frill really. 

Peace!!