Ruby on Rails

Ruby-on-Rails is used to develop web applications faster than any other language out there. Ruby-on-Rails, where RUBY is the language and RAILS is the framework which get things on-line.
OR The short—and fairly technical—answer is that Ruby on Rails (often abbreviated to Rails) is a full-stack web application framework, written in Ruby.
So, let me define a few of those terms.

• A web application is a software application that’s accessed using a web browser over a network. In most cases, that network is the Internet, but it could also be a corporate intranet. A big buzz has sprung up around web applications recently, due mostly to the increased availability of broadband Internet access and the proliferation of faster desktop machines in people’s homes.
• A framework can be viewed as the foundation of a web application. It takes care of many of the low-level details that can become repetitive and boring to code, allowing the developer to focus on building the application’s functionality. A framework gives the developer classes that implement common functions used in every web application, including:
  1. database abstraction (ensuring that queries work regardless of whether the database is MySQL, Oracle, DB2, or something else)
  2. templating (reusing presentational code throughout the application)
  3. management of user sessions
  4. generation of “clean” URLs
  
  A framework also defines the architecture of an application—something that
  can be useful for those of us who constantly fret over which file is best stored
  in which folder.
  
  In a sense, a framework is an application that has been started for you—and
  a well-designed one at that. The structure, plus the code that takes care of
  the boring stuff, has already been written, and it’s up to us to finish it off!

• Full-stack refers to the extent of the functionality the Rails framework provides. You see, there are frameworks, and then there are frameworks. Some provide great functionality on the server, but leave you high and dry on the client side; others are terrific at enhancing the user experience on the client machine, but don’t extend to the business logic and database interactions on the server.
  If you’ve ever used a framework before, chances are that you’re familiar with the model-view-controller (MVC) architecture. Rails covers everything in the MVC paradigm, from database abstraction to template rendering, and everything in between.

• Ruby is an open source, object oriented scripting language that Yukihiro Matsumoto invented in the early 1990s.
  Ruby makes programming flexible and intuitive, and with it, we can write code that’s readable by both humans and machines. Matsumoto clearly envisioned Ruby to be a programming language that would entail very little mental overhead for humans, which is why Ruby programmers tend to be happy programmers. What does Ruby syntax look like?
  
  

  8 * 5

  => 40
  

  3.times { puts "cheer!" }

  => cheer!
  =>cheer!
  =>cheer!
  

  %w(one two three).each { |word| puts word.upcase }

  => ONE
  => TWO
  => THREE

History: Ruby on Rails originated as an application named Basecamp,a hosted project management solution created by Danish web developer David Heinemeier Hansson for former design shop signals. Due largely to Basecamp’s success, 37signals has since moved into application development and production, and Heinemeier Hansson has become a partner in the company.