#installing linux

Stuck

I'm over 50% done with my Ruby course on Codecademy so far. I haven't finished it because I'm stuck on one problem. I made some serious attempts to solve it, gave up and wandered over to a free online book called Learn Ruby the Hard Way for some inspiration. A Rubyist (defn of Rubyist: a hardcore Ruby programmer) recommended the book to me. Flipping through Learn Ruby the Hard Way, and by flipping, I mean I clicked on the first exercise, I tried starting Exercise 0. Exercise 0 instructs you on how to set up your computer to run Ruby. You don't have to do this with Codecademy because you can program Ruby in Codecademy without using a code editor or IDE (integrated development environment).

Installing Linux

I thought all I would have to do was find some download page for Ruby, download it, and run it. Wrong! The very first instruction on Learn Ruby the Hard Way was to install something called a Ruby Version Manager (RVM). That would have been easy if the path that was linked to this instruction was working. It wasn't! I then googled "Ruby Version Manager" and get to this page. I tried running cmd (command prompt) on my computer and entered some of the gibberish from that page, but cmd complained, basically asking if I was a giant dummy. After (way too much) thinking, I realized that gibberish was probably meant for a Linux environment and not Windows. I don't really know what Linux is but I did know that in order to make this gibberish work and install RVM, I'd have to somehow install Linux first. Okay. Cool. I could do this. I googled "install linux" and several websites come up. I search until I found one that spoke English and not Computer-nese. You can choose to dual-boot which is, at start-up, you're given a choice to boot either Windows or Linux from your hard drive, or you can install Linux on a USB stick/external hard drive. This is how I made my choice: at the time, I didn't understand what dual-boot meant, but I knew what a USB stick was, so I dove into my purse, fishing around til I found an extra flash drive my brother gave me from a vendor show. I always keep one handy and some extra tampons too. Sometimes I confuse the two when blindly rooting around in my purse and accidentally pull out a tampon, startling the people who asked me if they could borrow a flash drive. I followed the instructions on how to install Linux and chose to use the distribution Ubuntu, which was named after the South African philosophy of "human-ness" or "humanity to others." Ubuntu also totes itself as "the world's most popular free OS." I was down with that. I downloaded Ubuntu, ran it, and restarted my laptop. When it restarted, it gave me the option to boot my computer in Windows or Ubuntu. My heart was pounding- I felt the same elated feeling that I used to get as a teen when a cute guy would call. It's an "I can't believe it!" moment. Ubuntu's pretty orange/red hues blew up my computer screen and I released a huge squeal, a few fist pumps, and high-fived my unfortunate friend Eddie who happened to walk into my room at that moment. Eddie was just trying to ask me when he, his girlfriend and I were going to lunch but I had bigger fish to fry. I smiled at him, ignored his stomach rumblings, and turned my focus back to my tiny computer.

Launching Ruby

I went back to Exercise 0 to figure out how to install RVM. The gibberish proved too much for me so I youtubed "how to install rvm ubuntu" or something like that. I found a random youtube video and the first thing the video asked was for you to open up a Terminal. A-what? It looked like the Windows command prompt so I started looking for it. I could not find it. I finally found a hint nested in some random website to press CTRL + ALT + T. Got it! I followed the instructions of said youtube video and tons of log lines came spilling out. I kind of felt like I was communicating with aliens because I couldn't really understand what was going on. Long story short- I might have unintentionally installed the entire world in that terminal. Finally stumbled on this very clear website, typed in the command under the heading "Third Party Tools...RVM." Ran that. Then typed in the command under the heading "Ruby on Linux." After installing, I still had to figure out how to launch Ruby. After a quick search, I found this: Ruby in Twenty Minutes. Twenty minutes is better than twenty hours which is how long I felt like I was working on this, so no problem. I figured out how to launch Interactive Ruby ("irb") by merely typing "irb" into the terminal and hit Return. Donezo. 

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