EdgeCase, a New Context company, is tackling the IT skills crisis and encouraging businesses to retrain their young developers in Ruby on Rails. As Rails becomes the default framework for Web startups, demand for Rails developers has skyrocketed.

EdgeCase has created Vital Rails, a three day course, in partnership with Jump Start Lab that will leave developers production-ready for building web applications. Driving through the major components of Rails attendees will build a take home application to help them develop the next killer app.

Jim Weirich, legendary Ruby on Rails software developer and chief scientist at EdgeCase, will lead the course, guiding attendees through the major components of Rails, demonstrating how to build a functional, deployable Rails application with multiple interacting objects, validations, and a functional user interface.

EdgeCase believe the easiest way to tackle the skills crisis is to train existing staff as Paul Wilson, EdgeCase UK’s Edinburgh based MD explains: “Living Social, when faced with a shortage of developers, set up their own academy to train new ones with help from Jumpstart Lab. And in the US, there is also an emerging Coding Academy movement that provides expert instruction and mentorship to students. I believe this approach would work in the UK too.   Jim’s incredible expertise and passion for Ruby will be a fantastic opportunity for developers to learn how to build the best web applications around and inject their new technical IT skills back into the market.”

Vital Rails is an intensive Rails course which runs from Wednesday May 16 to Friday May 18 2012 in Manchester. Over 500 new Rails developers have already been through the process in the US. Now UK developers have a chance to attend and learn how to be production ready for building web applications.

Jim Weirich has been developing now for over 25 years, working with everything from crunching rocket launch data on supercomputers to wiring up servos and LEDs on micro-controllers. Currently he works in Ruby and Rails as the Chief Scientist at EdgeCase, an Agile company specialising in rapid sustainable development of mobile and web applications.

To book your place on the course visit https://rebelcourses.com/courses/1. Vital Rails runs from Wednesday 16 May to Friday 18 May 2012 at Studio Venues in Manchester.