The nicest thing about RailsCasts, for me, was ASCIIcasts - I'm sure I'm in a minority, but I've never had much time for watching videos or listening to podcasts. GoRails seems to lack that, but perhaps for the majority that's a non-issue.
Chris from GoRails here! I'm absolutely going to be getting transcriptions added. So far this has been an experiment to see if people were interested and it appears that people definitely are.
This is just my advice - I teach, and must provide transcripts for my videos for students who are deaf, blind, or with learning disabilities.
I write my scripts out when I do my videos. It helps me prepare the lesson plan. I place all the code I'll type in there too. Then I record. And then if I deviate from my script, I can just fix it up. It doesn't need to be a 1:1 thing.
But I find that this really helps speed up the process because I have a plan in place, and the script can easily turn into the transcript.
Just thought I'd share to see if there's anything you can steal from this process.
Screencasts take a long time to produce. I got burned out at 73rd episode for rubyplus.org (within 6 months). I was publishing at a much faster rate. Now I have only articles at http://www.rubyplus.com
I loved the ASCII casts as I find text based information easier to reference than a video where you have to jump back a few seconds, hit pause, switch to a text editor, jump back, reload something, unpause etc etc.
This is a nice idea as there is a huge void left after RailsCasts hasn't gotten new episodes for a long time.
What's a little bit negative is the sound quality of the screencasts, it's really, really bad. It would be a really important improvement if you got a proper studio microphone and did some audio post-processing (I recommend https://auphonic.com/ for this kind of stuff, it's magic what they do).
I picked up a new mic (the Blue Yeti) because I know it's pretty terrible so far. About as bad as Ryan's were at the beginning actually if you go back to his first ones. ;)
Haven't done much recording before, so I'm learning the ropes. Auphonic looks really cool. I'll definitely be checking them out.
The classic technique for vocal capture with zero budget is to put a duvet over your head while recording. Failing this, you can pin the duvet to the walls of a wardrobe or something and sit inside that. Failing that, you may wish to build a little fort out of cushions and blankets or something. You may wish to do this anyway.
The traditional pop filter made from a pair of tights and a wire coathanger works very well too.
Also get some good closed back headphones asap, so you can monitor how you're coming in as you speak.
The next thing to think about after you're getting a decent capture is some kind of dynamics control, ie. compression, but that's beyond the scope of this comment.
Good tips! For monitoring, I love the Beyerdynamic DT 100 headphones. Being closed-back, you can be acoustically separated from your recording space, allowing you to hear its acoustical characteristics (which is the reason why engineers in studios sit in separate spaces from the musicians). You’ll be able to hear the effects of your experiments with duvets :)
Like the parent says compression is also quite important. It’s a big part of what makes radio voices sound radio, for example. Seeing it simplistically it is basically about lowering the dynamics of your sound—make the loud parts softer, so you can make the whole thing louder.
Any audio editing software comes with basic compression plugins. It takes some exercise to get right. Also, as you are making parts of your recording louder, any bad acoustics, noises artefacts are amplified.
Some recording software allows you to monitor effects while you are recording—this can help in finding the right acoustics. Of course there will always be a slight delay—a dedicated hardware compressor solves this problem.
One more thing: you should definitely look at the Reaper recording software: http://reaper.fm/
It has honorable pricing, an unlimited trial, and every feature you could ever need. It's particularly well suited for the kind of stuff you're doing: it has ripple editing, automatic alignment of repeated takes and so on. Can't recommend it enough. Make sure to read the manual though, it uses the mouse buttons in an unusual way.
I didn't think the audio quality was "really, really bad". It does have a slight echo effect, or maybe hall effect (not my area of expertise so please excuse me if I'm not describing it correctly).
I've watched a couple of them now and, if I hadn't seen your comment, I don't think I would have given the audio a second thought.
Thanks! One thing I noticed is that people who did complain about audio quality weren't receiving as much value from the content.
So far, the feedback from people who learned from an episode was that they didn't even notice the audio quality was bad which I'm happy about. It will improve as I have practice, but the content should matter more than the quality of audio.
I support Ryan needing some time off, I just wish he'd open up the Pro episodes if he's done. There are a few I want to watch, but I can't rationalize paying in my head if there's no new content coming out.
He deserves it. I'm not sure what happens exactly, but I know he's not charging the monthly fee anymore since he isn't active. It may just be a one-time $9 to get access to pro episodes.
To be clear; He is not currently charging $9/month. You are now charged a one time fee of $9 that is either indefinite, or until Ryan returns and starts adding new content.
It is definitely worth $9 for all of the existing great content.
Congratulations! It's a big step to put yourself out there for review ;) Your site looks nice and clean. These don't all happen at once, but here are some bits to think about:
- Look into adding transcripts (you will get lots of traffic from google)
- Add RSS feed + iTunes feed (www.apple.com/itunes/podcasts/specs.html)
- Add "feedback" tab at the top where people can get in touch
- Use that feedback to develop your product
- Have a marketing plan! How to get new customers and keep them.
- Have a way to generate episode ideas people are looking for (ask them)
- Create an intro with your name+email (if downloaded you want branding)
- Try trello.com for developing episode ideas (create lists/add nodes, etc)
Great to have someone pick up the baton from Ryan Bates - I've missed RailsCasts! It looks like you've released quite a number of episodes in a short space of time, so great you have a reasonable base to build on. Not wanting to suggest you slow down, but perhaps you might work on building up a backlog, then release on a regular cadence. That way if you can't produce an episode one week, you'll still be able to release a new episode.
This seems like a successor of Railscasts, exposing specific gems and walking through the installation and getting up to speed. Both GoRails and Railsscasts seem like a great resource, so all I can say is keep it up!!
The thing I would personally like to see more, is screencasts from (or similar to) Destroy All Software[0]. These don't typically target very specific gems, but rather cover general aspects of programming, design, testing methodologies and how those concepts integrate. I personally found those far more thought-provoking.
Another side-benefit is that whereas some screencasts about a specific gem or a library become almost irrelevant when new versions are released, those more approach-oriented talks and screencasts don't go stale that quickly.
Gary Bernhardt did a fantastic job with Destroy All Software and I wish he was continuing them. I really enjoyed his approach to screencasts because they were so thought-provoking. Hard to stop watching them at times.
I was also a fan of destroy all software screencasts, and found them incredibly useful in leveling up as a ruby developer. I've recently subscribed to Ruby Tapas http://www.rubytapas.com/, which I find similar to DAS in topic selection and quality.
I personally have mixed feelings about Avdi Grimm's approach. Some of his small tweaks are brilliant. Others feel to me like OO going totally overboard for no good reason. That's where I identify more with Gary Bernhardt's views. In that sense, DAS is perhaps much harder to replace.
I really love your selection of topics. For instance, the first one on PATH variables reminds me of when I first got started and wondered what all the auxillary command-line stuff does. I even learned something watching it now.
Most beginner tutorials just say "do this, do that" on things that aren't part of Rails proper. I found this really frustrating and glad you're thinking like a beginner would.
This is a great start and I think the presenter has a good, clear and precise tone. I don't think the audio is as bad as some of the people have made it out to be, but a decent mic probably wouldn't hurt.
One thing I would like to see that I'm spoiled from Railscasts is a quick summary of what you will be doing and the results that were achieved prior to the tutorial starting.
I found these videos yesterday through a lucky Google search and I think they are fantastic. I really like the... tone of it. The host excid3 seems really chill and I really like the way he communicates. Not too old and stuffy, yet very professional but still also pretty chill, just like that one coworker that you really like. Keep it the great work, mate.
I could not locate an RSS-feed, other then that of the blog.
I'd love to add this to my podcasts/video-casts. Or, at the least, to my RSS-reader to see when new episodes arrive. Maybe this is a good idea to add (and a nice subject to make a screencast about...)
I'm definitely going to add a feed for the screencasts soon. Just last week I set up the site as it is now so I'm happy to see such a great response. Lots to do now!
One thing I liked with Railscasts was its length. On average, a video fit between 7 and 14 minutes. GoRails seems like a great resource, but with some videos approaching 30 minutes long, it's hard for me to justify sneaking a peek while at work.
