Why's (Poignant) Guide to Ruby

About the book

Why's (Poignant) Guide to Ruby is a programming tutorial by Why The Lucky Stiff that teaches the Ruby language to newcomers, covering the basics of objects, methods and blocks. It does so through an unusual frame: cartoon characters, a running comic strip and a narrator who keeps interrupting the lessons with jokes and digressions. The result sits between a textbook and a comic book.

The book belongs to a moment when Ruby was attracting writers who wanted programming guides to feel less like manuals. Its subject matter is ordinary enough, computer science and the Ruby language, but the presentation is the point. Explanations arrive wrapped in stories about foxes, chunky bacon and other invented characters, and the reader is expected to enjoy the detour before returning to the syntax.

That makes the guide a document of a particular style of technical writing as much as a way to learn Ruby. Readers who want a straight reference will find the digressions heavy. Readers who want to remember why they started programming may find the approach refreshing.

How to read it

Approach the book as a serial rather than a reference. The lessons build, and the comic interludes carry recurring characters whose jokes reward attention across sections. Skipping the cartoons to reach the code removes much of what distinguishes the guide, though a reader in a hurry can treat the narrative as optional garnish.

The difficulty is uneven. Ruby's fundamentals are presented gently, but the whimsical register can obscure which sentences are instructions and which are performance. Keep a Ruby interpreter open and test the examples as they appear. Where a passage seems to be a joke, it often still contains a point about how the language behaves.

Who it suits

This suits beginners who already suspect they will bounce off a dry manual and want a gentler, stranger on-ramp to Ruby. It also suits experienced programmers curious about a well-known artifact of mid-2000s technical culture, and writers interested in how instruction can be wrapped in narrative. Anyone learning Ruby for a job will still need a conventional reference alongside it.

Reading considerations

Ruby has changed since the guide was written, so some idioms and installation advice will be dated; check examples against a current Ruby version rather than trusting them wholesale. The book's humor is relentless and specific, and patience for it varies. Treat the guide as a historical teaching experiment first and a working manual second.