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Learn Ruby on Rails: Formatting Time

Learn how to use the trusty strftime method to format a time, and see how Rails allows you to save this format for later use. Railscast.com

Learn Ruby on Rails: Clean Page Titles

If you are like me, you avoid creating page titles because it is kind of a pain. But in this episode I will show you a clean way to add titles to your pages.

Learn Ruby on Rails: group_by Month

Learn how to use the very useful group_by method to group an array by anything you want! In this episode I group an array of tasks by month then sort it properly. Railscast.com

Learn Ruby on Rails - in_groups_of

Have you ever wanted to visually line up items in rows and columns? The in_groups_of method makes this a cinch. Just watch out for the gotcha.

Learn Ruby on Rails - Cross Site Scripting

Another common security issue is cross site scripting. In this episode you will see why it is so important to escape any HTML a user may submit.

Learn Ruby on Rails - Hackers Love Mass Assignment

Your site may be at risk! When using mass assignment, you are giving the user complete control over that model and its associations. See how a hacker might use this vulnerability and learn how to stop it in this episode.

Learn Ruby on Rails - SQL Injection

One of the most common security problems for dynamic sites is SQL Injection. Thankfully Rails does everything it can in solving this issue, but you still need to be aware of it.

Learn Ruby on Rails - The Stack Trace

The stack trace can be a very useful tool when it comes to debugging. Learn the ins and outs of how the stack trace works in this episode. Note: I am using an older version of the Rails bundle here so it might be a little different than yours. The command in the newer version is called Install Plugin and requires you to type textmate_footnotes in the search.

Learn Ruby on Rails - Counter Cache Column

If you need to display the record count for a has_many association, you can improve performance by caching that number in a column.

Learn Ruby Rails - Eager Loading

One way to improve performance is to cut down on the number of SQL queries. You can do this through eager loading. Learn all about it in this episode!

Learn Ruby on Rails - Super Simple Authentication

The final piece of the administration puzzle: authentication. There are many different approaches which is why I saved this step for last. This episode will cover a few techniques including the simple solution used for this site.

Learn Ruby on Rails - Restricting Access

In this second part of the series on administration, you will learn how to lock down the site to keep the public from accessing the administration features.

Learn Ruby on Rails - Where Administration Goes

This is the first part of a three part series on building an administration system. Many developers choose to separate it completely from the public side of the site by placing it into an admin subdirectory. This episode will show you an alternative and often better solution.

Learn Ruby on Rails - Looping Through Flash

Displaying flash messages in the layout can be a pain at times. In this episode you will learn an easy way to display any kind of flash message by looping through the hash.

Learn Ruby on Rails - HABTM Checkboxes

It is often asked: how do I create a list of checkboxes for managing a HABTM association? Ask no more because this episode will show you how to do exactly that.

Learn Ruby on Rails - Virtual Attributes

Keep your controllers clean and forms flexible by adding virtual attributes to your model. This very powerful technique allows you to create form fields which may not directly relate to the database.

Learn Ruby on Rails - Fun with Find Conditions

You can pass more than simple strings to find conditions. Arrays, ranges, and nil values can be passed as well. In this episode you will see the tricks involved with passing these odd objects to find conditions. (Update: audio fixed).

Learn Ruby on Rails - Performing Calculations on Models

Did you know ActiveRecord provides class methods for performing calculations on models? You can even use these methods through associations.

Learn Ruby on Rails - Dangers of Model in Session

Be careful when storing a model in a session. It will behave differently than you expect and can easily get out of sync with the database. Instead of storing the model directly in the session, store the id to the model and use that to fetch it from the database.

Learn Ruby on Rails - Refactoring User Name Part 3

In the final part of this series you will see how to refactor your tests. Keeping tests clean is important because it will make testing easier to do in the future.