May 2025 Meeting

The May 2025 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 12th of May, from 6:00pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm).

This month we’re hosted by the lovely folk at Space4, near Finsbury Park. Full venue and registration details are given below.

Judge.me are very kindly providing pizzas before the meeting. Make sure you register so we know how many to get!

Agenda #

An event-sourced programming model for Ruby #

Ismael Celis says:

Exploring how Event Sourcing and Ruby can provide a cohesive programming model where auditable data, durable workflows and reactive UIs are the default.

1. LRUG May 2025 - Ismael Celis -An event-sourced programming model for Ruby

Mistakes were made, and definitely by me #

Andy Croll says:

CoverageBook is a decade-old Rails codebase which has seen at least one full internal rewrite.

Let’s have a walk through of perfectly “reasonable” decisions we made at the time that we’re now unravelling, and the new Rails-y-ness we’re using as we do it.

1. LRUG May 2025 - Andy Croll - Mistakes were made, and definitely by me

Practical AI in Ruby: What LLMs Can (and Can’t) Do For Your Projects Today #

Lorenzo Barasti says:

A no-nonsense exploration of integrating LLM capabilities into Ruby applications using ruby_llm and similar libraries, highlighting real-world use cases without the Silicon Valley hyperbole.

1. LRUG May 2025 - Lorenzo Barasti - Practical AI in Ruby: What LLMs Can (and Can’t) Do For Your Projects Today

Afterwards #

When the talks come to an end we’ll decamp to a local pub for some food, some drinks and some chat with your fellow attendees.

Of course, even though this is the socialising part and seems more informal, please remember that still we consider it to be a part of the meeting and covered by our code of conduct.

Venue & Registration #

Prior to attending you should familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees.

Secure your place #

Hopefully you all remember that physical meetings involve finite space and so to be guaranteed entry you need to register via ticket tailor.

Venue #

The address of the venue:

Space4 113-115 Fonthill Road N4 3HH

See on a map

The venue has a limit of 50 people. If you register and realise you can’t come, please use TicketTailor to give up your ticket so someone else can come in your place. We might be able to let in people on the night who haven’t registered, but we can’t guarantee it.

Accessibility info for the venue #

The event space is on the 1st Floor with step free access via a lift.

Posted by Chris Lowis on Apr 23, 2025

April 2025 Meeting

The April 2025 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 14th of April, from 6:00pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm).

This month we’re hosted by the lovely folk at Board intelligence in their offices, near Bank. Full venue and registration details are given below.

Agenda #

From React to Hotwire – An Unexpected Journey #

Maciej Korsan says:

For years, React has been the go-to choice for building frontend applications — but is it always the best solution? In this talk, I’ll share my journey from working extensively with React to discovering Hotwire, a radically different approach that enables dynamic applications without heavy JavaScript or complex state management.

Rather than a theoretical comparison, I’ll walk through real-world examples, demonstrating how I’ve implemented interactive features using Hotwire. I’ll also discuss my experiences, the challenges I faced, and some surprising discoveries along the way.

1. LRUG April 2025 - Maciej Korsan - From React to Hotwire: An Unexpected Journey

AI has many applications in our industry, we are just getting started #

Mario Gintili says:

AI has many applications in our industry, we are just getting started.

In this talk, I’ll explore an approach to AI-powered observability tooling that knows everything about you and your codebase.

I’ll demo some of the most recent tooling in AI-assisted development, show you how to enrich an LLM with highly relevant contextual information and display a little workflow that shows how to use AI to fix bugs faster as they happen in production.

1. LRUG April 2025 - Mario Gintili - AI has many applications in our industry, we are just getting started

Space for more talks #

You, maybe?

Afterwards #

When the talks come to an end we’ll decamp to a local pub for some food, some drinks and some chat with your fellow attendees.

Of course, even though this is the socialising part and seems more informal, please remember that still we consider it to be a part of the meeting and covered by our code of conduct.

Venue & Registration #

Prior to attending you should familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees.

Secure your place #

Hopefully you all remember that physical meetings involve finite space and so to be guaranteed entry you need to register via ticket tailor.

Venue #

The address of the venue:

Board Intelligence
24 Cornhill
City of London
London
EC3V 3ND

See on a map

The venue has a hard limit of 50 people. If you register and realise you can’t come, please use TicketTailor to give up your ticket so someone else can come in your place. We might be able to let in people on the night who haven’t registered, but we can’t guarantee it.

Accessibility info for the venue #

Stay tuned for more information about this.

Posted by Alessandro Proserpio on Mar 12, 2025

March 2025 Meeting

The March 2025 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 10th of March, from 6:00pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm).

This month we’re hosted by the lovely folk at Explore Group in their offices, near Aldgate. Full venue and registration details are given below.

Agenda #

Objects talking to objects #

Gavin Morrice says:

A review on what makes OOP such an effective paradigm to work in, followed by a critical discussion on some of the newer design trends in the Ruby space. We will discuss the concerns of relying too heavily on these patterns, and alternative approaches.

1. LRUG March 2025 - Gavin Morrice - Objects talking to objects

Unlocking the Awesome Power of Refactoring at Work #

Hemal Varambhia says:

In this talk, I recount and discuss how I refactored some legacy ruby code using the Simple Design Dynamo and ideas from “Tidy First” to make it more agile, and then, using Domain-Driven Design, take that agility to the next level.

1. LRUG March 2025 - Hemal Varambhia - Unlocking the awesome power of refactoring at work
2. “Unlocking the awesome power of refactoring at work” by Hemal Varambhia

Afterwards #

When the talks come to an end we’ll decamp to a local pub for some food, some drinks and some chat with your fellow attendees.

Of course, even though this is the socialising part and seems more informal, please remember that still we consider it to be a part of the meeting and covered by our code of conduct.

Venue & Registration #

Prior to attending you should familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees.

Secure your place #

Hopefully you all remember that physical meetings involve finite space and so to be guaranteed entry you need to register via ticket tailor.

Venue #

The address of the venue:

Explore Group
Portsoken house
155-157 Minories
London
EC3N 1LJ

See on a map

The venue has a hard limit of 60 people. If you register and realise you can’t come, please use TicketTailor to give up your ticket so someone else can come in your place. We might be able to let in people on the night who haven’t registered, but we can’t guarantee it.

Accessibility info for the venue #

There are a small number of steps to enter the building and then a lift to the 3rd floor.

Posted by Frederick Cheung on Feb 14, 2025

February 2025 Meeting

The February 2025 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 10th of February, from 6:00pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm).

This month we’re hosted by the lovely folk at Funding Circle in their offices, on Queen Victoria St. Full venue and registration details are given below.

Agenda #

Lightning Talks! #

Our February meeting is our annual event devoted to short talks of no more than 10 minutes.

We have space for at least 1 more talk, and it is our most popular event of the year. So, if you have been on the fence about giving a talk, there is no better opportunity than this. To put yourself on the map, email us at talks@lrug.org

AI tools for programmers #

fell sunderland says:

Why I don’t use AI programming tools, and I don’t think you should either.

1. LRUG February 2025 - fell sunderland - AI tools for programmers

Why our schema files kept changing #

David Lantos says:

Tale of an investigation why a local db:schema:load would change our db/schema.rb for seemingly no reason. Spoiler: varchar index

1. LRUG February 2025 - David Lantos - Why our schema files kept changing

10 years of RSpec in 10 minutes #

Jon Rowe will share:

a brief look into the history of RSpec and a glance into the future.

1. LRUG February 2025 - Jon Rowe - 10 years of RSpec in 10 minutes

Rails 8 + AI = Happy Life for Lazy Engineer to Create a Walking Skeleton #

Zhiqiang Bian says:

In this talk, I’ll explore how Rails 8, combined with AI-assisted tools, can help engineers rapidly spin up a walking skeleton—a minimal yet functional end-to-end system—with minimal effort.

1. LRUG February 2025 - Zhiqiang Bian - Rails 8 + AI = Happy life for lazy engineer

Never say, “Never say die!” #

Eleanor McHugh says:

Ruby is a high-level language, and there’s a general assumption that it’s ill-suited to low-level shenanigans. But is this true?

In this lightning talk I’ll introduce some basic Ruby tools for accessing low-level system features, concentrating on *nix platforms, and see if it’s possible to replicate tenderlove’s Never Say Die gem for recovering from segfaults.

1. LRUG February 2025 - Eleanor McHugh - Never say, “Never say die!”

The tag tale #

Jaehurn Nam says:

How we refactored Intercom’s conversation tagging service to not fake tag and made customers happy.

1. LRUG February 2025 - Jaehurn Nam - The Tag Tale

Beyond current state: capturing how and why things changed #

Yevhenii Kurtov says:

Introduction into managing state for objects with complex lifecycle when auditability is a must.

1. LRUG February 2025 - Yevhenii Kurtov - Beyond current state: Capturing how and why things changed

Self-Assessing against the Web Sustainability Guidelines #

James Smith says:

Sustainability is important, but it’s also hard, especially when building web projects. How do you know you’re doing it right? This quick talk will explain a tool I made for self-assessments against the Web Sustainability Guidelines, which you can use too!

1. LRUG February 2025 - James Smith - Self-assessing against the Web Sustainability Guidelines

Afterwards #

When the talks come to an end we’ll decamp to a local pub for some food, some drinks and some chat with your fellow attendees.

Of course, even though this is the socialising part and seems more informal, please remember that still we consider it to be a part of the meeting and covered by our code of conduct.

Venue & Registration #

Prior to attending you should familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees.

Secure your place #

Hopefully you all remember that physical meetings involve finite space and so to be guaranteed entry you need to register via ticket tailor.

Venue #

The address of the venue:

Funding Circle
71 Queen Victoria St
London
EC4V 4AY

See on a map

The venue has a hard limit of 75 people. If you register and realise you can’t come, please use eventbrite to give up your place so we can someone else come in your place. We might be able to let in people on the night who haven’t registered, but we can’t guarantee it.

Posted by Alessandro Proserpio on Jan 15, 2025

January 2025 Meeting

The January 2025 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 13th of January, from 6:00pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm).

This month we’re hosted by the lovely folk at Canva in their offices, on Hoxton Square. Full venue and registration details are given below.

Agenda #

Shape-up: the best parts #

Pablo Dejuan Calzolari says:

A talk about the 37 signals famous methodology and how we apply to 8 teams of development which work in Ruby on Rails.

1. LRUG January 2025 - Pablo Dejuan Calzolari - Shape-up the best parts

They’re not right, you’re not wrong #

Yevhenii Kurtov says:

We are going to look into the essence of what DDD is and why it came to be in plain English, without any consultant lingo. We will also evaluate its advantages, indicators of the possibility of successful adoption, and reasons to do so.

1. LRUG January 2025 - Yevhenii Kurtov - They’re not right, you’re not wrong

You? #

We’ve secured a venue, and have two talks, but there’s still space for a 10 minute talk. Could it be you? How about some of these ideas:

• What’s new in ruby 3.4
• What’s new in rails 8.0
• Lessons learned from tackling this year’s Advent of Code in ruby
• A review of your favourite talks from a bumper year of ruby content
• <%= all_possible_ideas.dig(:your, :idea) %>

Get in touch to volunteer!

Afterwards #

When the talks come to an end we’ll move to a nearby pub for some food, some drinks and some chat with your fellow attendees. Usually when we’ve visited Canva this has been The George & Vulture on Pitfield Street.

Of course, even though this is the socialising part and seems more informal, please remember that still we consider it to be a part of the meeting and covered by our code of conduct.

Venue & Registration #

Prior to attending you should familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees.

Secure your place #

Our hosts have limited space so you to be guaranteed entry you need to register for a free ticket via TicketTailor.

Note: as part of attending this month you will also need to agree to an NDA provided by our hosts, Canva.

Venue #

The address of the venue:

Canva
33 Hoxton Square
London
N1 6PB

See on a map

The venue has a hard limit of 150 people. Even with such a high number, if you register and realise you can’t come, please use TicketTailor to give up your ticket so someone else can come in your place. We might be able to let in people on the night who haven’t registered, but we can’t guarantee it.

Posted by Murray Steele on Dec 18, 2024

December 2024 Meeting

The December 2024 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 9th of December, from 6:00pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm).

This month we’re hosted by our friends at Intercom in their offices, on Old St. Full venue and registration details are given below.

Agenda #

Saving My Relationship with Rails #

Adam Dawkins says:

Setting healthy boundaries for a happy app. Our apps inevitably get more complex over time, and Rails isn’t always helpful when that happens. In this talk we’ll explore what a Rails app can look like with a ‘functional core’, and where to draw the boundaries between the core and Rails to stop things getting out of control.

1. LRUG December 2024 - Adam Dawkins - Saving My Relationship with Rails

Mistakes Were Made: Lessons from Failure #

Clem Capel-Bird says:

This is a story of failure: the things I broke delivering a big project, the lessons those mistakes taught me, and why breaking things can be an engineer’s best tool for learning.

1. LRUG December 2024 - Clem Capel-Bird - Mistakes Were Made: Lessons From Failure

Afterwards #

When the talks come to an end we’ll move to a nearby pub for some food, some drinks and some chat with your fellow attendees.

Of course, even though this is the socialising part and seems more informal, please remember that still we consider it to be a part of the meeting and covered by our code of conduct.

Venue & Registration #

Prior to attending you should familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees.

Secure your place #

Our hosts have limited space so you to be guaranteed entry you need to register for a free ticket via TicketTailor.

Note: as part of attending this month you will also need to agree to an NDA provided by our hosts, Intercom.

Venue #

The address of the venue:

Intercom
9th Floor
The Warehouse
211 Old St
London
EC1V 9NR

See on a map

The venue has a hard limit of 80 people. If you register and realise you can’t come, please use let us know via TickeTailor so we can give your place to someone in your place. We might be able to let in people on the night who haven’t registered, but we can’t guarantee it.

Posted by Murray Steele on Nov 18, 2024

October 2024 Meeting

The October 2024 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 14th of October, from 6:00pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm).

This month we’re hosted by the lovely folk at Zappi in their offices, on Camden High St. Full venue and registration details are given below.

Agenda #

Fighting Enshittification with ActivityPub #

James Smith says:

ActivityPub is the protocol that powers the Fediverse, a web of social sites like Mastodon, PixelFed, and a host of other free and open source tools. I’ll explain what ActivityPub is, how it works, and discuss the Federails Rails engine which allows you to add federation into your existing Rails web apps. By breaking open the silos of existing social media like this, we can fight the enshittification of the web and reclaim a bit of power from the massive companies that own our online lives.

1. LRUG October 2024 - James Smith - Fighting Enshittification with ActivityPub
2. Fighting Enshittification with ActivityPub - Slides
3. Federails, a Rails engine to add ActivityPub to your app
4. Caber, a simple ReBAC / Zanzibar gem
5. Mittsu, a Ruby port of Three.js
6. And the reason behind all this: Manyfold, a Rails app for managing and sharing 3d models

Plan to scale or plan to fail: an evidence-based approach for improving systems performance #

Jade Dickinson is giving us a preview of her RubyConf 2024 talk:

In this talk, I will present a methodology for replicating most standard Rails systems, for the purpose of load testing.

You can use this to find out how your system performs with more traffic than you currently encounter. This will be useful if you are on a Rails team that is starting to see scaling challenges.

At Theta Lake we operate at scale and are applying this methodology to proactively find ways to bring down our server costs. You don’t want to leave it until either your server costs soar out of control, or your entire system is about to fail. By seeing into the future just a little bit, you can find bottlenecks in your system and so find where you can improve its scalability.

Afterwards #

When the talks come to an end we’ll decamp to a local pub for some food, some drinks and some chat with your fellow attendees.

Of course, even though this is the socialising part and seems more informal, please remember that still we consider it to be a part of the meeting and covered by our code of conduct.

Venue & Registration #

Prior to attending you should familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees.

Secure your place #

Hopefully you all remember that physical meetings involve finite space and so to be guaranteed entry you need to register via ticket tailor.

We are trialling a new ticketing platform, Ticket Tailor. Do let us know how you find the user flow on it.

Venue #

The address of the venue:

Zappi
Theatre House
97 - 99 Camden High St
London
NW1 7JN

See on a map

The venue has a hard limit of 100 people. If you register and realise you can’t come, please use eventbrite to give up your place so we can someone else come in your place. We might be able to let in people on the night who haven’t registered, but we can’t guarantee it.

Posted by Frederick Cheung on Sep 09, 2024

September 2024 Meeting

The September 2024 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 9th of September, from 6:00pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm).

This time we’re being hosted by the lovely folk at Bloom & Wild in their offices, near Vauxhall. They’ve also kindly agreed to provide pizza and drinks. Full venue and registration details are given below.

Agenda #

B&W Rewards - Domains, Events & Ledgers #

Rachel Bingham and Boaz Yehezkel will be speaking about:

How we developed the B&W Rewards system. Starting from event storming with stakeholders and technical planning across squads to clear domain boundaries to
how we used an event bus and agnostic accounting system to keep things clear, concise and extendable.

1. LRUG September 2024 - Rachel Bingham - B&W Rewards - Domains, Events & Ledgers

From Spaghetti to Lasagna: Layering your code with DDD #

Lily Stoney

How to apply DDD to a monolithic codebase, the benefits and reasons why it can be beneficial, and how the event storming process can make the process of defining domain boundaries a simpler task!

1. LRUG September 2024 - Lily Stoney - From Spaghetti to Lasagna Layering your code with DDD

Afterwards #

After the talks are finished, and we’ve tidied up the venue a bit, we head over to a local pub for some food and drinks and the opportunity to chat with each other.

Of course, even though this is the socialising part and seems more informal, please remember that still we consider it to be a part of the meeting and covered by our code of conduct.

Venue & Registration #

Prior to attending you should familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees.

Secure your place #

Hopefully you all remember that physical meetings involve finite space and so to be guaranteed entry you need to register via ticket tailor.

We are trialling a new ticketing platform, Ticket Tailor. Do let us know how you find the user flow on it.

Venue #

The address of the venue:

Bloom and Wild
Unit 301 Vox Studios
1-45 Durham Street
London
SE11 5JH

See on a map

Bloom and Wild are based in the West Tower as you enter the courtyard - directions here.

There will likely be someone situated in the courtyard to direct people to the office and let them in but if not instructions on entering the building below:

• When you arrive at the West Building (the one without the concierge / cafe), please call 301 on the keypad and someone will let you in.
• Make your way to the lift (located up some small steps) and press 301 again in the keypad to the left of the lift doors.
• Once in the lift, press level 3 and this will bring you to reception

The venue has a hard limit of 50 people. If you register and realise you can’t come, please use tickettailor to give up your place so we can someone else come in your place. We might be able to let in people on the night who haven’t registered, but we can’t guarantee it.

Accessibility info for the venue #

Below you can find all the accessibility info for Bloom & Wild’s office:

For step-free access there are two lifts in the West Tower, one beside the stairs as you enter the building and the other to access the 3rd floor. We also have an accessible toilet.

Posted by Frederick Cheung on Aug 16, 2024

August 2024 Meeting

The August 2024 meeting of LRUG will be on Monday the 12th of August, from 6:00pm to 8:00pm (meeting starts at 6:30pm).

This time we’re being hosted by the lovely folk at the Electric Car Scheme in their offices, near Harlington & Hayes Elizabeth line station. They’ve also graciously agreed to provide pizza and beverages. Full venue and registration details are given below.

Agenda #

Turn Left for Bridgetown: An overview of a next-generation static(ish) site generator #

Ayush says:

Bridgetown is a modern progressive site generator with Jekyll ancestry. Allow me to be your guide as I take you on a whistle-stop tour of its biggest and best features; and show you how it brings Ruby-powered site generation into 2024.

Afterwards #

After the talks are finished, and we’ve tidied up the venue a bit, we head over to a local pub for some food and drinks and the opportunity to chat with each other.

Of course, even though this is the socialising part and seems more informal, please remember that still we consider it to be a part of the meeting and covered by our code of conduct.

Venue & Registration #

Prior to attending you should familiarise yourself with our README paying close attention to the code of conduct which applies to all attendees.

Secure your place #

Hopefully you all remember that physical meetings involve finite space and so to be guaranteed entry you need to register via ticket tailor.

We are trialling a new ticketing platform, Ticket Tailor. Do let us know how you find the user flow on it.

Venue #

The address of the venue:

The Electric Car Scheme
Floor 1
Shipping Building
Hayes
UB3 1HA

See on a map

The venue has a hard limit of 60 people. If you register and realise you can’t come, please use tickettailor to give up your place so we can someone else come in your place. We might be able to let in people on the night who haven’t registered, but we can’t guarantee it.

• Car/Motorbike: There is parking outside the front of the building. If you have parked there, Please inform a member of The Electric Car Scheme who will be waiting by the reception and we’ll register your car.
• Electric Car: There are charging terminals in our parking facility. Please contact ECS about this for further details
• Bike: There is a secure cycle facility. Please contact ECS prior to the event if you would like access to this.

Accessibility info for the venue #

Below you can find all the accessibility info for the Electric Car Scheme’s office:

• Your entire experience within our office will be step free
  • step free access to enter the Shipping Building
  • step free access from the entrance to the lifts and from the lifts to the office
  • step free office
• Harlington & Hayes Station does provide a step-free experience. There is also an underpass to avoid the main road
• There are 4 lifts for transporting people to each floor
• There is disabled parking at the front of the building
• There is 1 accessible restroom in the office, the door to corridor to the accessible restroom is not auto-open

Some caveats, which we hope will not deter anybody:

• The main doors into the Shipping Building do not auto-open - they open inwards with a push
• The doors to rooms that have access to the lifts are not auto-open

Posted by Frederick Cheung on Jul 20, 2024