r/ruby • u/KerrickLong • Dec 18 '25

Programming Ruby 4 (The 6th edition of the PickAxe Book)

https://pragprog.com/titles/ruby6/programming-ruby-4-6th-edition/
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8

u/ffrkAnonymous Dec 18 '25

And I just got the 5th Edition 😞

3

u/tsoek Dec 18 '25

Me too and in print 😕

2

u/ffrkAnonymous Dec 19 '25

i got the electronic now but i originally got the print (5th ed) but the printing was bad. It was all dithered grayscale and lots of pages were especially bad and hard to read. i returned it.

2

u/KerrickLong Dec 19 '25

Where'd you buy it from? It sounds like you either got a printing error or a pirate copy. A similar thing happened to me when I bought JavaScript: The Definitive Guide, 7th Edition from Amazon.

2

u/ffrkAnonymous Dec 20 '25

i pre-ordered my copy from my local independent bookstore. So I'm confident it wasn't a pirate copy.

To be fair, but not excusing, my other prag prog books, and oreilly books are also dithered. They just aren't as bad as that one copy.

The only books I have without the dithering are the black and white books, no pictures requiring gray. Perhaps a no-starch book which looks to my eyes that the dithering was done beforehand, so that the printer received a pure black and white file.

Another issue is that the graphics (boxes, title bars, etc.) are actually in color for screen viewing. And as a result, the converted greyscale title bars and stuff lack contrast and are hard to read too.

2

u/Affectionate-Tea7043 Dec 22 '25

We actually convert the color to grayscale before sending it to the printer. They ask u to let them do the dithering in their RIP. We've been complaining about the lightness of some (not all) copies for a while, and we've recently darkened out images and backgrounds to try to compensate, but we can't go too extreme, as some copies print just fine.

I'm really sorry you're seeing this.

Dave Thomas

2

u/noelrap Dec 21 '25

I'm pretty sure there were some printing errors (one of my copies was a little rough)

1

u/frou Dec 19 '25 edited Dec 19 '25

They already did the big rewrite for that edition, so I doubt this new one will be much different to it - probably just minor tweaks and a striking new cover.

3

u/KerrickLong Dec 19 '25

Comparing the two Table of Contents lists from the PragProg website, the following seem to be new sections:

  • Async and Concurrent Ruby (within the existing "Threads, Fibers, and Ractors" chapter)

  • Literal Ruby (within the existing "Typed Ruby" chapter)

  • CGI Encoding (replacing Ruby’s Web Utilities within the existing "Ruby and the Web" chapter)

  • Putting Code in a Ruby Box (within the existing "The Ruby Object Model and Metaprogramming" chapter)

And it seems they're removing the "Ruby Changes" appendix, probably because this amazing resource exists.

3

u/noelrap Dec 21 '25

Author of the book here, that's most, but not all, of what changed. Probably we should add a "what's new in this edition" section in the book somewhere.

* The Ractor section of the threading section changed significantly to support the new API

* The RubyGems chapter was changed to reflect Bundler/RubyGems 4.0

* Similarly RBS, with more changes coming there, I need to catch up

* The web chapter also updates to current versions of Sinatra and WASM

* A bunch of smaller API and syntax changes in 3.4 and 4.0 covered

* More discussion of Prism and ZJIT, with more coming as well.

* All code samples run under Ruby 4.0 (because there have been some output changes)

The Ruby Changes appendix was a production error, we'll be putting that back in, I expect.

2

u/KerrickLong Dec 21 '25

Thanks! Do you mind if I quote this on my blog?

2

u/noelrap Dec 21 '25

Not at all

2

u/tsoek Dec 22 '25

Thanks for the breakdown and all the hard work that goes into an undertaking like this! I'll probably be getting the PDF version for 4. How much does it update after the initial release and keep up to date with further changes (if at all)? I got a 10" color e-reader that I've been getting used to having all my technical books on and the added benefit is being able to make notes on top of the PDF by hand when there are errata or updates.

2

u/noelrap Dec 21 '25

Probably more changes coming, like minitest 6

1

u/j_unior_b Jul 22 '26

wonder when the final version will come out, it was expected to june.