Pretty sure you can just do the following by default on OS X: gem install rails bundler && rails new app && cd app && bundle install && bundle exec rails serve

Pretty sure you can just do the following by default on OS X: gem install rails bundler && rails new app && cd app && bundle install && bundle exec rails server http://localhost:3000 http://localhost:3000 Whether or not you install XCode is specific to Mac, and always will be an issue due to lack of gcc by default. If you're on Ubuntu, it should be pretty easy to roll: apt-get install ruby rubygems (or something to that effect) IIRC, you don't even need a database created/migrated until you decide you need one. I definitely think that Rails is harder to jump into now as a beginner due to the framework's evolution. However, these startup steps the author rants are all mostly "best practices" and not really necessary to jump in and start coding.