Automating Rails Development Environment Startup

I'm a fan of using Window Batch to automate repetitive tasks, so put together a little script that launches all the components of my Rails development environment.

On my system, all my Rails applications are stored in a base directory, along with a folder containing the following batch scripts. To launch the development environment for a particular Rails application, I can simply supply the batch file with the name of that application.

Each batch file contains the command to launch that component:

Starting up my Ruby on Rails Development Environment

1. Open a command prompt and navigate to project directory.
2. Start Spork server:
• bundle exec spork rspec
3. Open a second command prompt and navigate to project directory.
4. Start Autotest:
• bundle exec autotest
5. Open a third command prompt and navigate to project directory.
6. Start development server:
• rails server
7. Open a fourth command prompt and navigate to project directory, use this for Git operations while working.
8. Open code IDE/text editor of choice (mine's currently Komodo Edit 6.1)
9. Start working on RoR application!

I'm currently looking at ways to automate this startup procedure, possibly using a batch file or similar - any suggestions? Update: Post detailing startup using Windows batch scripts here

Ruby Learning Resources

A surreal, but seemingly useful tutorial:

• http://mislav.uniqpath.com/poignant-guide/book/

Creating a Rails Application from Scratch

1. Navigate to base Rails applications folder and execute:
• rails new newAppName -T
• The -T prevents rails generating Test::Unit files - we'll use RSpec
2. Copy/create three required files from a base application:
• .autotest
• .gitignore
• Gemfile
3. Install new gems with:
• bundle install