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Ruby Build a Todo List Application with Rails 4 Build a Todo List Application with Rails 4 Set up Git and Add Gems

 Tony Mikel
 Tony Mikel
10,661 Points
Posted by  Tony Mikel
 Tony Mikel
10,661 Points

No idea what's going on in this video

Besides the conceptual overview, I know we are adding gems (or libraries, am I right?) to this specific application, I have no idea what's going on. I understand the git stuff and the prerequisites but other than that.. Have no idea what he was walking me through on a low-level.

Cory Spitzer
Cory Spitzer
595 Points

Can you post a link to the lesson? Maybe I can help.

Matej Lukášik
Matej Lukášik
27,440 Points

It might be better ask specifically about what you don't understand so we try to explain. Do you have any question?

Brooke Stephenson
Brooke Stephenson
2,762 Points
Brooke Stephenson
Brooke Stephenson
2,762 Points

I am also lost. We are walked through different steps without any explanation of what the purpose of those steps is.

3 Answers

Rachelle Wood
Rachelle Wood
15,362 Points
Rachelle Wood
Rachelle Wood
15,362 Points

The rspec-rails and Capybara are both gems (or third party libraries of functionality) that aid in testing. If you have done any jQuery courses, think of them a bit like a jQuery plugin. In other words, these are small bits of code that other developers have worked on that you can incorporate into your program. The group :development, :test do etc stuff are Ruby (code) blocks that allow you to set rspec-rails and Capybara to your development/test and test groups respectively. If you don't know what a Ruby block is, I recommend taking some of the courses in the Learn Ruby track.

Roland Legrand
Roland Legrand
10,008 Points
Roland Legrand
Roland Legrand
10,008 Points

I agree. There is no specific question at this point as it all seems totally obscure. What is a capybara thing? What is a rspec-rails for? not to mention what all those folders and their contents are for. If one follows the track "rails" there is a huge gap between the very clear and slow introduction into Ruby and JavaScript and this part of the track, which all of a sudden seems to jump to an intermediate or advanced level.

Cheryl Jones
Cheryl Jones
13,405 Points
Cheryl Jones
Cheryl Jones
13,405 Points

I understand. I'm in the same boat. I'm hoping everything becomes clear later on because right now I'm just blindly following along and doing as he says but I have no idea why we are doing each step or what the outcome will be.