Author: Peter Armstrong
Publisher: Manning, 2008
Pages: 592
ISBN: 978-1933988504
Aimed at: Those using both Flex and Rails
Rating: 5
Pros: A well presented practical overview of two technologies
Cons: You'll need other books as well
Reviewed by: Ian Elliot

In principle you shouldn't need a book dedicated to making Flex and Rails work together because they are fairly isolated from one another. That is, Rails is the server and Flex is the client and there should be no special tweeks needed to get them talking to one another. However, if you need a book that outlines how to work with both to build an application this is what you need. It starts out with a Hello World example which really will get you up and running and seeing how things work. It covers Windows, Mac OS X and Linux using Flex Builder.

Part II goes on to consider using Flex to build the UI and designing Restful Rails servers. It continues with an example elaborating it in well defined steps. Part 3 deals with refactoring using Cairngorm. Part 4 deals with finishing an application, Refactoring using RubyAMP and a section on AIR.

All of the ideas are well described and there is plenty of motivation for why things are done in a particular way. The whole book reads like an extended tutorial but it’s a fairly easy read and you will learn a lot from it. You will need other books on the individual topics but if you are using both technologies then this is a recommended way to get a good overview.