September 2021 Meeting

The September 2021 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 13th of September, from 6:20pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm).

Full registration details are given below, and please do note that the zoom meeting url is only sent to registered attendees, so please do make sure you do it.

Agenda #

How to use flamegraphs to find performance problems #

Jade Dickinson will be running an interactive workshop:

Slow Ruby code can be a puzzle, but it doesn’t have to be that way. In this talk you will see how fun it can be to use flamegraphs to find performance problems. You’ll enjoy this talk if you know you have slow areas in your Ruby application*, and would like to learn how to find the code responsible.

You can find out more about what you need to prepare for the workshop via Jade's mailing list post about it.

Afterwards #

The zoom call will stay open after the workshop is finished for a little bit if attendees want to chat for a while. It's not as good as shouting across a table at the Singer Tavern, but we make do with what we can. The speakers may hang out so you can ask them questions you weren't able to during the meeting. If you've got any ideas for something better, then please do let us know at organisers@lrug.org. Thanks!

Registration #

Prior to attending you must familiarise yourself with our README paying particular attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees, even though we float on screens like so many tiny programming postage stamps.

Secure your place #

Thanks to capitalism we can only host a limited number of people in our Zoom meetings, so you need to register via eventbrite. The link to the zoom meeting will only be sent to registered attendees on the day of the meeting, around about 6pm. Keep an eye out for the email and check your spam just in case.

Give yourself a head-start by downloading the zoom client (lol, as if you don't already have it).

Posted by Chris Lowis on Aug 24, 2021

August 2021 Meeting

The August 2021 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 9th of August, from 6:20pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm).

Full registration details are given below, and please do note that the zoom meeting url is only sent to registered attendees, so please do make sure you do it.

Agenda #

10 years on - building startups with Ruby on Rails #

Tom Blomfield from Generation Home:

Tom was the founder of GoCardless (built in Ruby) and Monzo. He recently joined the board of Generation Home (also Ruby) - a London-based mortgage provider. He's come back to talk about the evolution of the London startup community and how successful fintechs are still building on Ruby on Rails

1. LRUG August 2021 - Tom Blomfield - 10 years on - building startups with Ruby on Rails

Do regex dream of Turing Completeness? #

Daniel Magliola says:

We're used to using Regular Expressions every day for pattern matching and text replacement, but… What can Regexes actually do? How far can we push them? Can we implement actual logic with them?

What if I told you… You can actually implement Conway's Game of Life with just a Regex? What if I told you… You can actually implement ANYTHING with just a Regex?

Join me on a wild ride exploring amazing Game of Life patterns, unusual Regex techniques, Turing Completeness, programatically generating complex Regexes with Ruby, and what all this means for ou understanding of what a Regex can do.

1. LRUG August 2021 - Daniel Magliola - Do regex dream of Turing Completeness?

Afterwards #

The zoom call will stay open after the talks are finished for a little bit if attendees want to chat for a while. It's not as good as shouting across a table at the Singer Tavern, but we make do with what we can. The speakers may hang out so you can ask them questions you weren't able to during the meeting. If you've got any ideas for something better, then please do let us know at organisers@lrug.org. Thanks!

Registration #

Prior to attending you must familiarise yourself with our README paying particular attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees, even though we are only tiny flat moving images like prisoners in the Phantom Zone.

Secure your place #

Thanks to capitalism we can only host a limited number of people in our Zoom meetings, so you need to register via eventbrite. The link to the zoom meeting will only be sent to registered attendees on the day of the meeting, around about 6pm. Keep an eye out for the email and check your spam just in case.

Give yourself a head-start by downloading the zoom client (lol, as if you don't already have it).

Posted by James Adam on Jul 21, 2021

July 2021 Meeting

The July 2021 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 12th of July, from 6:20pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm).

Full registration details are given below, note that the zoom meeting url is only sent to registered attendees, so please do make sure you do it.

Agenda #

Breaking Up Monoliths With CRC cards #

Hemal Varambhia from Simply Business says:

Rapid iteration and feedback is key to enhancing agility. This is an experience report on how we appealed to a modelling technique from the 1980s, CRC cards, to figure out how we might break away part of a monolith at the architectural level and guide refactorings at the softer design level.

1. LRUG July 2021 - Hemal Varambhia - Breaking up monoliths with CRC cards

Ruby on Rails for Fun and Social Good #

Alex Rudall from Beam says:

Beam is the world's first crowdfunding platform for homelessness. Alex will talk about what Beam does and how Beam uses Ruby on Rails, Airtable, Vue.js and Tailwind to help them change the lives of homeless people.

1. LRUG July 2021 - Alex Rudall - Ruby on Rails for Fun and Social Good
2. A new way to tackle homelessness | TEDx Brighton

Improving Rails scalability using modularity with enforced boundaries #

Rob Faldo says:

One of the aspects of Ruby & Rails that gives it the reputation for not scaling well is that unlike some languages/frameworks it has no way to enforce modularity. Over time and with many developers this usually leads to 'spaghetti code'. This talk will introduce a solution to this problem called packwerk (a ruby gem by Shopify), as well as touch on some alternatives.

1. LRUG July 2021 - Rob Faldo - Improving Rails scalability using modularity with enforced boundaries
2. Improving Rails scalability using modularity with enforced boundaries
3. Blog post on "Improving Rails scalability using modularity with enforced boundaries"

Afterwards #

The zoom call will stay open after the talks are finished for a little bit if attendees want to chat for a while. The speakers may hang out so you can ask them questions you weren't able to during the meeting. If you've got any ideas for something better let us know at organisers@lrug.org.

Registration #

Prior to attending you should familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees, even though we are all in our own little bubbles.

Secure your place #

Even in a virtual world there are limited places for attending the meeting so you need to register via eventbrite. The link to the zoom meeting will only be sent to registered attendees on the day of the meeting, around about 6pm. Keep an eye out for the email and check your spam just in case.

Do prepare yourself in advance by downloading the zoom client.

Posted by Murray Steele on Jun 22, 2021

June 2021 Meeting

The June 2021 meeting of LRUG will be on Wednesday the 9th of June, from… wait, what? Wednesday?!

Yes, that's right. This month, we’re doing something a little different and joining up with many of the other European Ruby user groups (including our good friends in NWRug, Shrug, SW Ruby and ScotRuby) to have a sort-of mini Rails-Conf.

The details are now available at the EMEA on Rails site and we will keep you updated as we find out more about how to join in on the day. You can also follow the event on Twitter. The event will run through the afternoon and early evening (the schedule showing GMT + 1 is the same as BST, our current timezone), and you'll be free to dip in and out as your own schedule allows.

This is all a bit of an experiment, but hopefully it will be a fun opportunity to interact with some other user groups, and take a little bit more advantage of the remote-ness of our circumstances at the moment. In July, we'll be back to our regular second-Monday meetups.

Hopefully see you then!

Posted by James Adam on May 20, 2021

May 2021 Meeting

The May 2021 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 10th of May, from 6:20pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm).

Full registration details are given below, note that the zoom meeting url is only sent to registered attendees, so please do make sure you do it.

Agenda #

So far there's one talk on the agenda, but we're always looking for me so please email talks@lrug.org if your interested in sharing a talk with us.

Your fortified cookie jar: Demystifying cookie security in Rails #

Ayush Newatia says:

You may have heard that cookie security is hard with the need to worry special flags and encryption. Actually, Ruby on Rails makes it super simple to securely store data in cookies. In this talk I'll explain the different types of cookies supported by Rails and what Rails does under the hood to secure the data they contain.

1. LRUG May 2021 - Ayush Newatia - Your Fortified Cookie Jar

Is this feature a waste of time? #

Tom Lord says:

Sometimes a new feature may be objectively worthwhile; but often one might be left wondering “Does this actually make our product better?”, or “Is this making the business more money?”.

In this talk, I will explore the virtues of defining North Star metrics, AB testing product variations to statistical significance, and using funnel analysis to quantify a feature's value.

1. LRUG May 2021 - Tom Lord - Is This Feature a Waste of Time?

Afterwards #

We leave the zoom call running after the talks are over for as long as our collective rumbling stomachs can handle. Why not stick around and chat with the handful of attendees who also don't have zoom fatigue yet. If you've got any ideas for something better let us know at organisers@lrug.org.

Registration #

Prior to attending you should familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees, even though we are all in our own little bubbles.

Secure your place #

Even in a virtual world there are limited places for attending the meeting so you need to register via eventbrite. The link to the zoom meeting will only be sent to registered attendees on the day of the meeting, around about 6pm. Keep an eye out for the email and check your spam just in case.

Do prepare yourself in advance by downloading the zoom client.

Posted by Murray Steele on Apr 25, 2021

April 2021 Meeting

The April 2021 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 12th of April, from 6:20pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm). It's our first meeting of the 2nd year of remote-only LRUG.

Full registration details are given below, note that the zoom meeting url is only sent to registered attendees, so please do make sure you do it.

Agenda #

We've got one talk lined up for you this month so far. We've always space for more though. Email talks@lrug.org, if you've got something you'd like to share with your fellow LRUG attendees.

Git Rebase #

Brooke Kuhlmann says:

Git is the dominant tool for version management. Misunderstanding and misusing Git can cost development teams time, energy, and money. Few better examples exist than Git's default merge workflow which creates repositories that are hard to read, debug, and maintain. In this talk, I'll show how to use the Git Rebase Workflow instead, which puts Git to work for you to produce quality code that's easy to handle and kicks your team into high gear.

Your questions will be answered by Brooke Kuhlmann who is the founder of the Alchemists where the mission is to create an inclusive and thoughtful collective focused on the craft, quality, ethics, and security of software engineering.

1. LRUG April 2021 - Brooke Kuhlmann - Git rebase
2. Alchemists.io | Presentations | Git Rebase

Afterwards #

Despite spending a year doing this, we've yet to work out a decent online version of the post-meeting pub. That said, we leave the zoom call running aftet the talks are over and the formal goodbyes have been said. You're more than welcome to hang out with the handful of folk who do stay on. If you've got any ideas for something better let us know at organisers@lrug.org.

Registration #

Prior to attending you should familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees, even though we are all in our own little bubbles.

Secure your place #

Even in a virtual world there are limited places for attending the meeting so you need to register via eventbrite. The link to the zoom meeting will only be sent to registered attendees on the day of the meeting, around about 6pm. Keep an eye out for the email and check your spam just in case.

Do prepare yourself in advance by downloading the zoom client.

Posted by Brooke Kuhlmann on Mar 15, 2021

March 2021 Meeting

The March 2021 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 8th of March, from 6:20pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm), taking place once again in our virtual home. This will mark a full year of running LRUG remotely. Wild times.

Full registration details are given below. Please remember that we will only be sending out the zoom meeting url to people who have registered, so please do make sure you do it.

Agenda #

We've got two talks this month, but as ever, we always need more, from April onwards. Email talks@lrug.org and we will do our very best to nurture your seed of inspiration into a healthy plant of… content.

Data as a foreign language, or: A tale of two (or possibly three) type systems #

Matt Patterson says:

Working with XSLT/XPath’s XDM type system in Ruby requires learning how to translate between two very different type systems in a way which allows for idiomatic Ruby without ignoring the bits of XDM which aren’t quite Ruby-shaped. Oh, and the only open-source implementation is in Java, so Java’s type system is in the mix.

I’ll look at a couple of cases where the different approaches and assumptions of Ruby and XDM (and Java, which just can’t help sticking its nose in) interact in an interesting way.

1. LRUG March 2021 - Matt Patterson - Data as a foreign language, or: A tale of two (or possibly three) type systems

Sundae Club: Livestreaming Ruby on Rails #

Max Shelley:

I host a weekly livestream where each week I work on a Ruby on Rails app and, along with those watching, we plan then build different features and discuss different possible approaches. It’s casual, aimed very loosely at learners, hopefully useful and receives positive feedback from those that watch or interact.

When I mention livestreaming to others, they’re often interested in how it works, what I get from doing it, what those who interact with the streams get out of it and how they could potentially get involved in streaming. This talk aims to answer those questions, along with any others you may have, come and say hello!

1. LRUG March 2021 - Max Shelley - Sundae Club: Livestreaming Ruby on Rails

Afterwards #

We're all at home so there's no post-meeting pub meetup, however a few attendees often hang around on in the zoom call after the talks are over. It's a pale-shadow of the pub meetup, so if you have some ideas about doing something better do get in touch at organisers@lrug.org.

Registration #

Prior to attending you must familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees, even though we are all just little silent video characters.

Secure your place #

Even in a virtual world there are limited places for attending the meeting so you need to register via eventbrite. The link to the zoom meeting will only be sent to registered attendees on the day of the meeting, around 6pm. Keep an eye out for the email and check your spam just in case.

Do prepare yourself in advance by downloading the zoom client.

Posted by James Adam on Feb 25, 2021

February 2021 Meeting

The February 2021 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 8th of February, from 6:20pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm). The online nature of our little gathering continues.

Full registration details are given below, but do note that we will only be sending out the zoom meeting url to people who have registered, because we have limited places, so please do it.

Agenda #

It's our annual ⚡️lightning⚡️ talks event. All short talks, all the time. As ever, we're still looking for volunteers (we have room for up to eight of you), so get in touch talks@lrug.org, if you've got something to say.

An intro to Bridgetown: A static site generator for the modern JAMStack era. #

Ayush Newatia:

Bridgetown is a new Ruby-powered static site generator that was forked from Jekyll 4.1. It has a focus on modern ideas and includes Webpack as a first-class citizen. In this talk I'll give a demo of what differentiates Bridgetown from Jekyll and some of its best features; followed by a short Q&A.

1. LRUG February 2021 - Ayush Newatia - An intro to Bridgetown: A static site generator for the modern JAMStack era

The Path(name) of least resistance #

Fred Cheung:

Ruby has many classes that deal with files, paths or directories, but one that often doesn't get enough credit is Pathname. Pathname unifies the other pretenders to the throne with a consistent, rubyish interface that is a joy to work with.

1. LRUG Februrary 2021 - Fred Cheung - The Path(name) of least resistance

Are we parallel yet? A first look at Ruby Ractors #

Lorenzo Barasti:

A speedrun through actor-based concurrency, the Ractor API and the future of parallel applications in Ruby.

1. LRUG Februrary 2021 - Lorenzo Barasti - Are we parallel yet? A first look at Ruby Ractors

Uncovering some ruby magic in awesome_print #

Mark Burns:

ap 1.methods takes an Array of Symbols as input and outputs details it shouldn't know about the methods themselves. ap 1.methods.dup has the same behaviour, but ap 1.methods.take(1.methods.length) does not. I will peer into the magic and divulge its secrets.

1. LRUG February 2021 - Mark Burns - Uncovering some ruby magic in `awesome_print

Taking Rails Offline #

Mike Rogers:

Networks are unreliable & drop out all the time! Lets make our apps more resilient to that!

1. LRUG February 2021 - Mike Rogers - Taking Rails Offline

Afterwards #

The best we can do at the moment is promise that a few of us will hang out on the zoom call after all the talks are done to blather on for a bit. It's a poor substitute for actually meeting up in person, but we'll persevere with it. If you have some ideas about an alternative approach, then let us know at organisers@lrug.org.

Registration #

Prior to attending you should familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees, even though we are all in our own little bubbles.

Secure your place #

Even in a virtual world there are limited places for attending the meeting so you need to register via eventbrite. The link to the zoom meeting will only be sent to registered attendees on the day of the meeting, around about 6pm. Keep an eye out for the email and check your spam just in case.

Do prepare yourself in advance by downloading the zoom client.

Posted by Murray Steele on Jan 24, 2021

January 2021 Meeting

The January 2021 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 11th of January, from 6:20pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm). Still online.

Full registration details are given below, note that we will only be sending out the zoom meeting url to people who have registered, so please do make sure you do it.

Agenda #

We've got one talk lined up for you this month, but we always need more. Email talks@lrug.org, if you'd like to start your 2021 presenting to the enthralled hordes of LRUG attendees.

Recruiting 101 instead of 404 #

Thayer Prime says:

Recruitment is one of the hardest problems in scaling your tech company. Everyone wants the best, everyone wants diversity in hires, everyone wants the most affordable people - but companies rarely have the time, money or ability to invest in creating a world class recruiting team. So what are some of the common questions we can review, and how do you navigate the pitfalls of bad hiring as a starter for ten? Come and find out from an LRUG community Q&A to address some of the most commonly asked questions, and get some starter tips on hiring humans, not resources.

Your Qs will be A'd by Thayer Prime, of Team Prime who started life in the tech industry as a programmer twenty years ago, before turning to the dark arts of recruitment. She's been lucky enough to work with the likes of Sir Tim Berners-Lee, Jimmy Wales, Apple, Stripe and NASA to name just a few. She has founded three successful companies herself, and often acts as a strategic adviser to founders and C-level executives growing their tech capacity within their organisations.

For info on how to submit questions for the talk check out Thayer's email to the mailing list explaining the situation.

1. LRUG January 2021 - Thayer Prime - Recruiting 101 instead of 404

Afterwards #

We're all at home so there's no post-meeting pub meetup, however a few attendees often hang around on in the zoom call after the talks are over. It's a pale-shadow of the pub meetup, so if you have some ideas about doing something better do get in touch at organisers@lrug.org.

Registration #

Prior to attending you should familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees, even though we are all in our own little bubbles.

Secure your place #

Even in a virtual world there are limited places for attending the meeting so you need to register via eventbrite. The link to the zoom meeting will only be sent to registered attendees on the day of the meeting, around about 6pm. Keep an eye out for the email and check your spam just in case.

Do prepare yourself in advance by downloading the zoom client.

Posted by Murray Steele on Dec 22, 2020