Hobo, the Rapid Web App Builder for Ruby on Rails, Moves from Beta to Version 1.0

Hobo, the rapid web app builder for Rails, moves from beta to Version 1.0 after 3 years of community development. Celebrations start with two new Hobo books, a new logo and screencast and a whole universe of 1.0 improvements.

London, UK (PRWEB) February 24, 2010

Hobo, the open source rapid web app builder for Ruby on Rails, has officially reached Version 1.0 after three years of focused development effort by the Hobo community and sponsorship support from Barquin International in Washington, DC. As part of the celebration we're releasing a bunch of new stuff for newcomers and the community to enjoy.

As well as a shiny new logo, we are pleased to announce the release of two free ebooks designed to help Hobo developers quickly and easily make the most of the popular toolset:

Rapid Rails with Hobo
A step by step introduction to rapid development of data-rich web applications using the Hobo extensions for Ruby on Rails (313 pages)

Hobo at Work
The definitive guide to the Hobo extensions for Ruby on Rails (219 pages)

The current version of Hobo has changed a lot since the early days of the beta, and has been grabbing the attention of a growing number of coders across the globe. "I've been involved in systems development for 30 years and Hobo is one of the most impressive tools I have run into", says developer George Treisner, "My partner thinks I'm a genius because of how fast I built the system, how easy it is to modify and how good it looks and works."

Some of the key changes:
a) Super polished model-based UI now requires very little customization for general use. Developers of small apps can now be up and running with their working application in minutes.

b) Built-in sophisticated migration generator. No more writing migrations, Hobo does it all for you with one simple command, including automatic index generation. And it's all DB agnostic. You get the fast development cycle of the new 'schema-less' databases, without abandoning the database you already know.

c) Hobo's 'lifecyles' make it super easy to implement multi-step processes such as friending in social apps. This is Hobo's answer to the popular state-machine plugins. Rather than just a model extension, we provide the full stack including an automatic, customisable UI. Very common lifecycles like 'forgot password' and 'activate account by email' are either baked-in or available as easy to follow recipes.

A quick overview of the improved Hobo functionality can be viewed in the new Hobo screencast at http://www.hobocentral.net.

"We're over the moon with the launch of Hobo 1.0", says Tom Locke, creator of Hobo, "The community has been fantastic, and we are particularly pleased to see just how many developers are now using Hobo for their Rails projects around the world. We're especially delighted that our sponsor, Barquin International, has found it so valuable for their USDA/NIFA government projects. Open source is really taking off in US government circles at the moment, and we see this as further validation of the maturity of this type of open source tool."

Since its launch in November 2006, the Hobo plugin has been deployed in many professional web development projects across the world, ranging from general purpose web applications to more sophisticated enterprise level projects.

• Beanbag: http://www.beanbaglearning.com
• They Shoot Music: http://theyshootmusic.at
• Art$Work: http://artsworkohio.com/
• Cavortify: http://cavortify.com/
• Padhouses: http://padhouses.com/

"We strongly believe the future of software development will depend on the use of top quality open source tools, and Hobo is proving to be a hugely valuable asset in our development projects", says Ramon Barquin, CEO of Barquin International, "The stability and robustness of the code and the expert enthusiasm of the Hobo community continue to help us deliver significant benefits to our clients at every stage of the development process."

Note to Editors:

About Hobo:
Hobo is an open source fully customizable rapid development toolkit for Ruby on Rails, which helps developers build anything from throwaway prototypes to meticulously crafted full-blown web apps in a fraction of the time it takes with conventional tools. More at http://www.hobocentral.net or contact Tom Locke on +1 (805) 222 4966.

About Barquin International:
Barquin International is a full-service business intelligence firm, based in Washington DC, dedicated to assisting organizations in planning, designing, implementing and operating knowledge management e-government information architecture and data warehousing solutions and strategies. More at http://www.barquin.com or contact Kelley Willitts on +1 (202) 296 7147.

###