RAILSFULLSTACK · BLOG

Opinionated Rails posts.

Production patterns from real OSS codebases (Gumroad, Mastodon, Discourse, Forem), and a dev's-eye view of the Rails hiring market.

Jul 27, 2026

Rails Concerns: When They Help, When They're a Smell

Concerns are the cheapest abstraction in Rails and the most-abused. The line I draw between concerns earning their file and concerns hiding the pile.

rails opinion concerns patterns code-smell

Jul 22, 2026

Hotwire Turbo 8: Page Refresh as a Broadcast, and Why Morph Changes the Math

Turbo 8's two headline features — page-refresh-as-broadcast and morph rendering — let you ship SPA-feeling UX without writing a controller per interaction. What it actually enables, and what's still in flight.

rails hotwire turbo turbo-8

Jul 16, 2026

Propshaft and the Rails Asset Pipeline After Sprockets

Rails 8 ships Propshaft as the default asset pipeline. It does dramatically less than Sprockets did — and that's the point. What changed, what migrating looks like, and where the edge cases bite.

rails rails-8 propshaft sprockets assets

Jul 1, 2026

The Enumerable Methods I Keep Coming Back To

Nine Enumerable methods beyond map and select that I actually use, grouped by intent. The ones that replaced loops in my code.

ruby cheatsheet enumerable

Jun 30, 2026

The Hash Methods I Actually Reach For in Ruby

Ten Hash methods that show up in my code every week, grouped by intent. The ones I wish I'd known on day one of writing Ruby.

ruby cheatsheet hash enumerable

Jun 21, 2026

Inside Discourse's DistributedCache: Two Levels and a Deferred Write

Discourse runs multi-process Rails on every box. Their DistributedCache pattern keeps a per-process Hash hot and uses MessageBus to invalidate. A walkthrough.

rails oss discourse caching performance

Jun 14, 2026

Inside Mastodon's PostStatusService: Idempotency, Locks, and a Long Workflow

Mastodon's PostStatusService is what posting a toot looks like at scale. Idempotency keys, distributed Redis locks, scheduled posts. A walkthrough of the patterns I'd steal.

rails oss mastodon service-objects idempotency

Jun 11, 2026

Value Objects in Rails: Money, Coordinates, and the Quiet Refactor

Strings and integers are fine until they're not. Here's how I introduce value objects to a Rails app — when a PORO is enough, when composed_of fits, and when to reach for money-rails.

rails patterns value-objects domain-modeling

Jun 10, 2026

Presenter Pattern in Rails: SimpleDelegator, Draper, or Just Helpers?

When one model grows a dozen view-shaped methods, you have three options. Here's how I pick between SimpleDelegator, Draper, and plain helpers — and where ViewComponent draws the line.

rails patterns presenters decorators draper

Jun 4, 2026

Sidekiq vs SolidQueue vs GoodJob in 2026

Three background job systems, three different bets on storage and ops. The side-by-side I wish someone had given me before my last queue migration.

rails sidekiq solid-queue good-job background-jobs

Jun 3, 2026

Add Hotwire Turbo Streams to one form in 10 minutes

A single comment form, no JavaScript, appended to the page on submit. The minimum Turbo Streams setup that actually pays off.

rails hotwire turbo how-to

Jun 1, 2026

Why I still default to PostgreSQL even after Rails 8 pushed SQLite

Rails 8 made SQLite a first-class production database. I think the SQLite-everywhere movement is right about a lot — and wrong about the default.

rails rails-8 postgresql sqlite opinion

May 31, 2026

Solid Cache: when it replaces Redis and when it doesn't

Rails 8 ships a database-backed cache store. I break down where it earns its place over Redis and where Redis is still the right answer.

rails rails-8 solid-cache redis caching

May 28, 2026

The Date and Time cheat sheet I keep open in Rails

Time.current vs Time.now, Date.current vs Date.today, time zone parsing, and the rule I follow for every timestamp I touch in a Rails app.

rails ruby time-zones cheatsheet

May 27, 2026

Inside Forem's ReactionHandler: the Result pattern done in 14 lines

Forem's ReactionHandler ships a tiny inner Result class that captures everything I want from a service object's return value. Walking through it line by line.

rails service-objects patterns oss forem

May 24, 2026

Policy objects in Rails: Pundit vs Action Policy vs rolling your own

When current_user.admin? checks stop scaling, you reach for a policy object. I compare Pundit, Action Policy, and a plain PORO — and the bar each one earns.

rails authorization pundit action-policy patterns

May 21, 2026

includes vs joins vs preload: a decision guide

The four Active Record association loaders, what SQL each generates, and the rule I apply at the keyboard to pick the right one.

rails active-record n+1 performance

May 20, 2026

Add Solid Queue to a Rails app in 10 minutes

A short, copy-pasteable walkthrough for swapping in Solid Queue as your Active Job backend, with the dev-mode Puma plugin and a real Job class at the end.

rails solid-queue background-jobs how-to

May 18, 2026

Vanilla Rails is plenty, revisited

37signals' Vanilla Rails essay is mostly right and partially wrong. Here's the line I draw between the apps that prove the point and the ones that disprove it.

rails architecture opinion 37signals

May 15, 2026

Rails 8's auth generator changes my from-scratch advice

Rails 8 ships a built-in authentication generator. Here's what it actually produces, and where Devise still earns its place.

rails rails-8 authentication devise

May 13, 2026

Inside Gumroad's BundleSearchProductsService: a 45-line tour

A line-by-line read of one of the cleanest service objects in Gumroad's open-source codebase, plus the two changes I'd make.

rails service-objects oss gumroad

May 13, 2026

The twelve Active Record finders I actually use

A reference card of the Active Record query methods that earn their place in my day-to-day Rails code, with one example each.

rails active-record cheatsheet

May 7, 2026

The decorator pattern in Rails: when ViewComponent is overkill

A presenter is the cheapest abstraction in Rails. Here's the bar I apply before reaching for one — and the bar before reaching past it to ViewComponent.

rails patterns view-layer decorators

May 4, 2026

Query objects in Rails: when scopes stop scaling

An opinionated take on the query object pattern: the shape that earns its file, the bar I apply, and the scopes that should stay scopes.

rails patterns architecture query-objects active-record

May 4, 2026

When to use a form object in Rails

An opinionated take on form objects, with code from Forem and Mastodon. The bar I apply: a form has to do something the model can't.

rails patterns architecture form-objects

May 4, 2026

Service objects in production: when they earn their file, and when they don't

An opinionated take on service objects, with code from Gumroad and Forem. The bar I apply: a service has to do something a model method can't.

rails patterns architecture service-objects