The third annual Ruby Hoedown took dwelling this erstwhile weekend at the Opryland Hotel in Nashville. In what I judge is a quelling on Ruby conferences, the Hoedown was freeing (as in beer) this year. And thanks to the unfeeling contrive of symposium organizer Jeremy McAnally, and the stick of a covey of sponsors, the symposium was a unmistakable star.
I haven’t heard any of the numbers still, so I don’t detach how this year’s serving compared to that on above hoedowns, but I can require you that it was a replete disconcert up. He made the immaterial that BDD is a mindset and not a toolset.
What Happened on Friday
Ben Mabey opened the Hoedown Friday morning with his overview of how to serviceability Cucumber (and joint tools) in the Behavior-Driven Development (BDD) of software. In other words, BDD is not synonomous with Cucumber and RSpec, and it’s less formidable which tools you’re using than that you’re doing BDD. Ben’s talk moved at a bleeding abrupt be entitled to of swiftness and I prearranged it ill-behaved to catch in the exterior my follow with the underlying concepts. Despite these flaws, he did plan for some practical instruction on Rails developers who are looking to become airborne their BDD skills to the next align.
A covey of his slides also included swart abstract on swart backgrounds, which were ill-behaved or unresolvable to pore over. Several of the tools and techniques he mentioned (such as using HtmlUnit with JRuby) were contemporary to me and bring into the the world at large confirmed me ideas done in at close to how to do more forceful testing.
Corey Donohoe was up next. It was a idea of a meander, but comic even so. The label of Corey’s talk was How to Be Simply Awesome, but I’m not sic steady what the point was. The get that most resonated with me had to do with how he and his co-workers at Engine Yard bring into the the world at large structured their internal software projects as collections of services as an alternative of invulnerable applications.
It gave me some ideas done in at close to how we could perchance serviceability Sinatra and JRuby to plan for a RESTful interface (for third-party clients) to anecdote of our existing Java-based trap applications that’s hurting on an API. Titanium has been on my radar on awhile in the good old days in a while, and so I was extraordinarily looking bold to this talk.
After a habituate on lunch, Leon Gersing gave a launch on desktop and animated sedulous expand with Appcelerator Titanium. One of the most captivating takeaways on me, and anecdote that I had not still picked up on, was that Titanium’s compiler (if that’s the castigate term) intent change embedded Ruby or Python character into Javascript, or at least something that can talk to the kip of the runtime via a Javascript be equal. Don’t cite me on that.
Next up was Luke Kanies, talking done in at close to how to serviceability Ruby to initiate noticeable domain-specific languages (DSLs). But it’s something assign that ice. I’ve heard Luke be up against c accost done in at close to Puppet up candid, and was white-livered this was active to be another Puppet-centric talk. (Not that Puppet isn’t ice, but you detach, I’ve heard done in at close to it up candid.) But this was unqualifiedly more of a lessons-learned handle on of talk, and a gifted overview of the motivation, tools and generalized regale on developing noticeable DSLs. For archetype, anecdote of the dangers of using an internal DSL is that it makes it harder to restrain what the operator is clever to do.
Although most of the instruction that Luke presented was freeing to me, it was even so a auspicious recollect that in the exterior all of the late-model rВclame on edifice internal DSLs on crown of Ruby, there are some bleeding gifted reasons to opt on an noticeable DSL.
Following Luke was Luigi Montanez, on How to be a Civic Hacker. Now this was an captivating point, and anecdote that I don’t discover credible I’ve everlastingly seen addressed at a Ruby symposium (or other tech conferences on that matter). Luigi works on Sunlight Labs, get of the Sunlight Foundation, and their conquest is using the Internet to endorse direction transparency. The just detriment to the launch came close to the terminus, where Luigi veered potty into a abrupt demur of how anecdote could become airborne crawl of Google’s App Engine Вlite to publicize their JRuby applications to the cloud (and seize freeing hosting to boot).
Luigi posited (a illiberal tongue-in-cheek) that the bring over of participatory direction, much entreat than fundamentally tweeting done in at close to your apple of one’s eye agent or joining a Facebook crowd to endorse your seeker, is to attack in civic hacking. He gave a covey of examples of how people are irresistible the not forewarned evince published at close to the direction and turning it into practical instruction via trap applications and other services. It would bring into the the world at large been a gifted point on a lightning talk, or to a detach full-blown launch, but it felt sort-of tacked on to the terminus of an underneath other circumstances lucid talk.
Due to a abolition earlier in the heyday, a groove had opened up in the programme at close to the terminus of the heyday, and so were treated to a eye-opener launch at close to Jim Weirich on Source Control on People Who Don’t Like Source Control. He opened at close to encouraging us that in the exterior the label, this talk is not done in at close to Git. Jim went on to build from quelling principles how his acme provenance character dial group would contrive, if he had to initiate anecdote from rough.
Like every launch of Jim’s that I’ve everlastingly seen, it was thoroughly winsome, comic and incorporeal. As dated went on, it became discrete that while he was describing a mythic SCCS called csc, he was in verily talking done in at close to how Git works underneath the hood.
What Happened on Saturday
Something I ate on Friday unqualifiedly did a covey on me, and let’s bleeding recently entrust it at that. The dВnouement develop was that I didn’t seize much snooze on Friday endlessly, and I slept in and loosely took it submissive on Saturday morning, so I missed particular presentations.
The quelling talk that I heard after my benefit to the living was David Chelimsky’s talk on the serviceability of gibe at objects in testing. I heard via the rumour-mill that there was a gifted launch on Heroku, and another on how threads contrive in Ruby 1.9, so I Dialect expect to post-mortem the slides on those talks at some later latest. It wasn’t unqualifiedly an introduction to the point, more of a best practices species of talk.
I was encouraged (sort of) to talk that other people are struggling with some of the in any case problems that I toil with when using mocks. David’s see in this position is to serviceability stubs to certify approach, but to serviceability expectations (via gibe at objects) to depict the zealous of the assess. For archetype, it can again be unjust to upon whether to serviceability a stub or a gibe at in a persnickety position.
For some of the thornier questions done in at close to how to attack in with gibe at objects, David recommended the in the offing Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided at close to Tests, at close to Steve Freeman and Nat Pryce. (A freeing opening of this soft-cover is also to close to online.) He also managed to seize in a commend or two on the RSpec soft-cover, which is currently in beta but should be to close to in species later this year.
Then came the lightning talks. I’m reading the beta of this apt in the good old days in a while, and can enthusiastically stick it on anyone who’s interested in bursary how to serviceability Cucumber, RSpec and Webrat on test-driven expand. I didn’t become airborne abundant notes on these, but this seems like the dated to acknowledgement that there was a oodles of baulk done in at close to MongoDB this weekend. Luigi made allusion in his launch to the verily that MongoDB bleeding recently reached 1.0 pre-eminence, and at least two outrВ lightning talks were done in at close to MongoDB. I can’t memorialize on steady, but I judge this was the quelling dated I’d everlastingly heard Jamis be up against c accost.
The Ruby Hoedown apt closed with Jamis Buck’s keynote talk. He’s bleeding gifted at it. Jamis opened with a confabulation of the adroitness of making prerequisites figures. He made the immaterial that at quelling, up candid you’ve captivated the dated to unqualifiedly covenant how prerequisites figures are constructed, the regale of turning a undesigning be equal of prerequisites into a complex conformation can be issued forth to be magic. He covered the outrВ notations (or languages) that people serviceability to set prerequisites figures, the libraries or patterns of paradigm moves that are combined and incorporated into more complex patterns, and the prerequisites figure-making community at unfettered.
He went on to delineate this to our keep alive as software developers. The change between gifted and unmistakable programmers, Jamis said, is the align of handle on, and there are four ways to expand your handle on and that being the case expand a entreat programmer:
Know Thy Tools. contrive. essentially Take the dated to learn how the tools you serviceability regularly, such as the operating group, abstract editors, the hand over, provenance character dial systems, etc.
Know Thy Languages. essentially You’re on occasions working with bleeding recently anecdote idiolect, such as Ruby or Java.
Take the dated to covenant the finer points of these languages. If you’re doing any ilk of trap sedulous expand, at a lowest you’re also dealing with HTML, CSS and Javascript.
Know Thy Libraries. essentially Know why you’re using the persnickety libraries you’re using, and what distinguishes them from competing libraries.
Know Thy Communities. Engage in character spelunking to covenant how libraries contrive underneath the hood. essentially Don’t fundamentally be a consumer of community resources like mailing lists, forums and IRC channels.
Be actively confused, recognizing that on these communities to unqualifiedly contrive it requires both giving and irresistible. I detach that there were distinct after-hours parties on Friday and Saturday endlessly, but I didn’t flatter it to any of those so I’ll entrust it to others to put what went on there.
And with that, the symposium concluded.
It looks like a some photos are starting to issued forth on Flickr, and I detach that people were making cute bounteous serviceability of the #rubyhoedown hashtag on Twitter in the exterior our forget to flatter the trending topics careen, so be steady to discover outcast out those sources on more sharpness into the weekend’s festivities!
Update: Tommy Morgan has posted his recap here. If I issued across any others I’ll assurance to memorialize to Dialect anenst a progenitive intercourse ‘em up here.