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Troubleshooting a Rails Application

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General Tips

1:25 with Jay McGavren

We want to leave you with a few general tips that aren't specific to Rails, but will help keep bugs from getting out of control.

You can learn more about testing your Rails apps here.

Want to learn more about version control using Git? Check out our Git Basics course.

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    We wanna leave you with a few general tips that aren't specific to Rails but 0:00
    will help keep bugs from getting out of control. 0:03
    First make sure you're writing automated tests or specs. 0:06
    If you don't have tests you could accidentally make a change that 0:10
    breaks a part of your app that was already working. 0:13
    Worse it might be a long time before you find out about it, and 0:15
    they'll be hard to fix later. 0:18
    But if you have tests and they run them after you make changes, they'll fail and 0:20
    let you know as soon as you break something. 0:24
    Check the teacher's notes for more info. 0:26
    Second, make your changes in small batches when you can, and test them frequently. 0:28
    If you discover an error after you change five lines of code, 0:33
    you may have to look at all five lines to find the problem. 0:36
    If you discover an error after you change one line of code, 0:38
    you know the error is on that one line. 0:41
    Third, use a version control system like Git. 0:44
    Version control lets you keep all the old versions of your files. 0:47
    If you encounter an error and you just can't seem to find the source, 0:50
    you can roll back to an old version of your code that doesn't have the error. 0:53
    If you're not using version control, you might be stuck looking for 0:57
    the problem for a long time. 1:00
    If you'd like to learn more about version control, 1:01
    make sure to check the teacher's notes. 1:03
    Lastly, don't be afraid to use your editor's Find in Files feature to search 1:06
    all the files in your project for a particular string. 1:10
    Sure, it's a bit of a hack, but 1:13
    sometimes it's the quickest way to find the line of code you need. 1:14
    That's it for this workshop. 1:17
    I hope you learned a few things that will give you more confidence next time you 1:19
    encounter an error in a Rails app. 1:22
    See you soon. 1:24

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