A while ago it was easier to get in (and the framework wasn't simpler), there was a lot of beginner-friendly materials (like the "do a blog in 15 minutes" video

A while ago it was easier to get in (and the framework wasn't simpler), there was a lot of beginner-friendly materials (like the "do a blog in 15 minutes" video). If you started from there it was actually hard not to understand the file structure. (hint: rails/rake commands are your friends to quickly scaffold your models/pages). I agree that a lot of people don't make the distinction between rails and ruby. I had interns who where quite surprised you could use ruby without rails, and that "it's actually a complete language!". Ruby on its own is charming indeed. Rails gets the job done: few other tools enable you to finish a functional MVP in a day or two. But if you start to add gems for everything it just becomes a pain in the ass. edit: I was f*cking mad when they added coffeescript. fortunately it's simple to disable (just removing the gem and changing a setting for the file generators)