How to Handle Eclipse as a ROR IDE?

Why use IDE: In the modern web era we can’t ignore the importance of ruby on rails to develop quick web applications on the fly. The best thing about ruby on rail is that its syntax is similar to that of PHP or Python and hence it is extremely easy to learn this technology in less span of time. This helped ruby on rails to get an overnight popularity among the web developers. Ruby on rails can also be learned by fresher and to kick start their career in web development. But again no framework or language is complete without an IDE and so the case for ruby on rails as well. Today we will discuss about one of the best IDE of the IT industry that is eclipse for ruby developers.

Eclipse- A powerful IDE for Java, Flex etc: Well eclipse doesn’t need much introduction because it is not a new IDE for the web developers. It was already power packed with Java, Flash etc and there, it has already proved its efficiency as an IDE. This time eclipse is designed to fit with RoR framework. Let us have a glance over how it can help in developing modern web applications by the ruby developers.

Install Eclipse for RoR: Well eclipse is a product from IBM. So no web developer will hesitate to put his hands over this piece to test its charm. Well before installing eclipse, we have to now that it need the sun java JRE in order to run in your system. So we must install the JRE first. Now you can download eclipse latest version and unzip it to C:\rails\eclipse. Then we can create a shortcut to eclipse.exe and can start the workspace to “..\workspace”. That’s it.

Configuring Eclipse for RoR: After installation we should check if there is any updates are available. If so, we must update our IDE for more efficiency and assistance for the ruby developers. Then we should find some plugins available for eclipse IDE and must install them for more efficient programming. After all these steps, we should configure our eclipse IDE. As a ruby developer we understand that whatever we write on the RoR platform i.e. in the RHTML form. But how eclipse will understand this unless until we give instruction. So we have to configure the eclipse IDE to treat our code as RHTML unlike a text file. For the same, we should go to “Window” then click on “preferences”. Now in the left tree, click on the “workbench” and then click on “file associations”. Now click on the “add” button at the top of the dialog which is next to the file types. Here we have to enter “*.rhtml” in the dialog box and click “ok”. Similarly, we should add any new type in the file types list to make it understandable by the IDE. There we must choose HTML editor so that it also can understand the HTML code while writing on the IDE. Now the ruby developers can start coding on the eclipse IDE which is integrated to RoR.

Debugging using Eclipse: After proper installation of eclipse IDE web developers can take the assistance from the IDE in writing better code on RHTML. Ruby developers can get features like auto completion of variable names, method names, class names etc along with indentation, debugging and reusable codes. So eclipse can serve as a boon for the RoR developers. To get maximum benefits of ROR development, you may consider hiring services of a ROR development company.

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