DHH on Rails World 2023 & Rails 7.1

In this episode, Jason and Chris welcome DHH, who joins them after the recent Rails World event. They cover a wide range of topics from the Rails Foundation’s mission to attract new talent to open source misconceptions, the value of open source contributions as gifts, and the importance of boundaries between contributions and vendor relationships.  DHH shares insights into his current projects, including “Prop Shaft” and “Skiff,” addressing deployment challenges and building static sites. 

[00:00:29] DHH describes the incredible energy and positive atmosphere at Rails World, emphasizing the importance of in-person gatherings. 

[00:05:02] A discussion comes up about the foundation’s role in supporting open source and attracting sponsors like Shopify for the benefit of both the community and businesses.

[00:11:54] DHH talks about the misconception that open source is primarily about unpaid labor and how it’s important to avoid becoming an unpaid employee.

[00:15:47] DHH announced in his keynote at Rails World seven new things coming out and he tells us some he most excited about.

[00:20:00] DHH describes the development journey from initial concept to validating in production applications, extracting into a library or framework, and ultimately making it the default for broad use. 

[00:22:12] Jason asks about the static site work that DHH is thinking about, and he introduces a project he’s working on called “Skiff,” built on top of Kamal for deploying static sites.

[00:26:28] Chris brings up a question about when to build your own solutions or use existing ones, and DHH highlights that it depends on the domain and the impact it has on daily work. 

[00:29:30] DHH talks about the problems with the existing job running solution, Resque, and the need to maintain multiple gems to patch it. 

[00:34:46] Jason brings up Webpacker and DHH discusses his frustration with complex bundling systems like Webpacker and his eagerness to simplify them. 

[00:36:02] Chris talks about the concept of finding the right abstraction layer where there’s a balance between providing a simple interface and allowing users to dig deep into specific features when necessary.

[00:38:32] The importance of recognizing fundamental improvements like esbuild and adopting them is highlighted.

[00:40:59] The conversation shifts to the maintenance of separate frameworks like Hotwire and Kamal, and the question of separate maintainer teams and regular Rails releases is brought up.

[00:43:55] DHH describes Hotwire as a “two and a half party” with substantial development happening with Basecamp but contributions from a considerable external community.

[00:45:14] DHH talks about the evolving nature of projects like Turbo and the need for experimentation to address real-world issues.

[00:50:37] We end with DHH highlighting the inherent tension between project creators and users and clarifies that not all open source projects operate as democracies. 

Links:

Jason Charnes Twitter
Chris Oliver Twitter

• Chris Oliver X/Twitter
• Andrew Mason X/Twitter
• Jason Charnes X/Twitter