book

RESTful Rails Development

by Silvia Puglisi

October 2015

Intermediate to advanced

350 pages

7h 26m

English

O'Reilly Media, Inc.

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Why Rails and Not Node.jsWhy (I Think) You Should Read This BookWhat You Will Find in This BookWhat You Will Not Find in This Book (And Where You Can Go for Answers)ResourcesCoding StyleConventions Used in This BookUsing Code ExamplesHow to Contact UsAcknowledgments
REST and HTTPArchitectural AbstractionsIntroducing RESTRESTful Programming and HypermediaDesign ConceptsRESTful ArchitecturesRESTful Interfaces: Hypermedia and Action ControlsWrapping Up
Getting to Know Ruby on RailsSetting Up Ruby and RailsRVMrbenvUsing an InstallerThe Architecture of a Rails AppModel-View-ControllerObject-Relational MappingBundlerChoosing an EditorHello RailsTest-Driven DevelopmentWrapping Up
Application Programming InterfacesDos of API DevelopmentDo KISS and DRYDo URI DesignWhy You Should Use Rails to Build APIsThe WikiCat APIPreparing the DatabaseScaffolding the ModelsCoding Controllers and SerializersTestingWrapping Up
Life Is CRUDRESTful RailsTesting RESTful Routing in RailsHTTP SemanticsGETHEADPOSTPUTDELETEWrapping Up
Hypermedia and Adaptable APIsREST PatternsCreating Hypermedia InterfacesResource-Oriented ThinkingDesigning Explorable ResourcesHATEOASThe WikiCat Hypermedia APIWrapping Up
Asynchronous RESTful OperationsAsynchronous REST in RailsRails Workers and Background JobsCreating an Application Skeleton in Three Easy StepsUploading Images Through an API CallCreating Workers and a Jobs QueueCreating a Resource QueueCallbacksWebSocketsWrapping Up
Testing in RailsMocks, Stubs, Doubles, and DummiesTesting RESTful ServicesWrapping Up
Basics of SOA and Distributed Systems DesignLegaciesHeterogeneityComplexityRedundancyMicroservices ParadigmsThe Evolutionary ApproachThinking in Terms of Microapplications and ServicesThe Thematic Walks APIThe Wikipin APIThe Citywalks APIDiscovering the /lib DirectoryDefining the ModelsBuilding the ControllersWrapping Up
Wanderings in Frontend LandRendering and Templating in RailsEmber.js: A Framework for Creating Ambitious Web ApplicationsDesigned for Application DevelopmentMVC Paradigm of FrontendRails MVC Versus Ember.js MVCPlanning the ApplicationGetting Started with Ember.jsModeling DataRouting in Ember.jsDefining the TemplatesWriting a ComponentExploring Walks Through CategoriesWrapping Up

How Is an API Deployed?API ManagementPaaS SolutionsDeploying the Wikipin API on OpenShiftPreliminary StepsMeet JenkinsWrapping Up
API ManagementAPIs Are Not Consumer ProductsManaging Your Community’s HappinessDeveloper ProgramsApp and API QualityUser HappinessData Management and AnalyticsWrapping Up
Creating a Weather ServiceIf This Then SomethingAdhering to the Terms of ServiceAsynchronous RESTWrapping Up
Web Development Is a Broad TermDeveloping for MobileStreaming Data into a Firefox OS AppDeveloping an Internet of Things AppRails on the Raspberry PiCreating the Raspboard AppWrapping Up
Data Comes from EverywhereMonolithic Versus Microapplication ArchitecturesMonitor, Optimize, and EnhanceApplication LogsMonitor Request Response TimesMonitor ProcessesMonitor Your Server DiagnosticsComprehensive Monitoring SolutionsActions and EventsPlotting DataWrapping Up
Scaling RailsCreating a Middleware for Different APIs to CommunicateConfiguring a Reverse Proxy with NginxMeet LuaBundle Things TogetherCachingScaling Is Not Necessarily Difficult and PainfulWrapping Up
How to Protect User Privacyk-anonymityDifferential PrivacyPrivacy-Enhancing TechnologiesIs My Data Safe?Common Sources of InsecurityIs Rails Secure?SessionsCross-Site Request ForgeryRedirectionFile UploadFile DownloadLogsConclusions
Everything Started with HypertextCreating an HTTP Server in Ruby, QuicklyThe HTTP ProtocolArchitectureParametersMessagesConnectionsStatus Code DefinitionsAccess AuthenticationContent NegotiationCachingSecurity Considerations

Content preview from RESTful Rails Development

Chapter 9. Mapping Data Streams onto an Application UI

In this chapter we are going to venture into aspects of frontend programming and user interface (UI) design. We are going to discover Ember.js, a JavaScript framework, and a different MVC pattern. This is almost a non-Rails chapter, in which we discover how data streamed from our APIs is integrated into a web application to build what is defined as the user experience (UX). The application that will be designed and built in this chapter will use the Citywalks API and display the user’s walks on a map.

Wanderings in Frontend Land

Up to this moment we have been developing API-only applications. You may look at these apps as a sort of skeleton upon which different products can be built. Once you have some data streams, you can combine them in a way that others—users and services—can also consume and reuse.

Therefore, depending on what application you are working on, at a certain point you will need to venture into frontend programming.

Frontend development is defined as the development of those elements of an application that the user sees and directly interacts with. Ultimately users cannot directly interact with JSON; they will need visual elements to manipulate the information that the application is receiving from the different data points.

The widely held misconception about frontend development is that it mainly means creating the application’s graphical interface—i.e., arranging the information containers and action elements ...