1. Customize the startup behavior in the console by creating a .irbrc file (or .pryrc) in your active directory

During startup IRB always attempts to run a ruby file named .irbrc in your current directory. If it isn’t found, it recursively attempts to find it in each parent in directory tree, eventually defaulting to the ~/.irbrc in your home directory if it exists.

This allows you to load your own startup behavior create a .irbrc file (.pryrc if using Pry) and add whatever ruby code you want executed when running the console.

Example (in your my_rails_project/.irbrc file):

def some_method
  "only_visible_in_console"
end

a = "defined in .irbrc!"

Code within this directory will then be run any time you load the console:

my_rails_project> irb
...
irb > puts some_method
 => "only_visible_in_console"
irb > puts a
 => "defined in .irbrc!"
2. Ruby saves the result of your most recent command in a special variable named ‘_‘

Pretty self explanatory. Very useful if you forget to assign the result of a time consuming operation to a variable.

Example:

irb > User.limit(1000).map {  |user| user.created_at }

irb > result = _
irb > puts result
...
3. Add a semicolon to the end of a statement to suppress default output

This is really useful for particularly verbose outputs that flood your command history:

user@localhost:> irb
> user_sql_adapter = User.connection;
> raw_user_attributes = user_sql_adapter.execute("SELECT * from users");
4. Use the pretty print method (pp) to inspect the properties a hash:
~/.../my_rails_project> irb
irb > require 'pp'
irb > user = User.first;
irb > puts user.attributes
5. Use the reload! method to update code changes made outside of the console

Again, pretty self-explanatory, but extremely useful to know as well.

Comments