Ruby on Rails, again
jasonleow • 27 Aug 2024 •
The very first version of Lifelog was made in 2019/2020 using Ruby on Rails, called Your Life In Months. Ironically, despite taking paid web dev courses on Udemy, I never managed to ship anything from that, lest a SaaS. It ended being a free YouTube course on Rails that got me shipping my first SaaS with users.
So Rails and I go way back…
And now, I’m back using Rails again, thanks to a freelance gig. And I must say, it’s been super refreshing coming back to a monolith, full stack framework after wandering in JavaScript land for the 1-2 years. I mean, I like Vue and Nuxt. They are probably the only JavaScript frameworks I can get along with. And Vue was the framework that got me my first MRR dollar! But yet, can’t help but compare my Nuxt experience with Rails.
There’s something just different and uncomplicated about mature tech like Rails. It’s easy to read and understand. Lots of conventions which you follow and it just works. There’s dependencies too (like gems) but feels more manageable, and you know why they are there, unlike the Library of Alexandria’s worth of node_modules lurking in the dungeon of your app.
I know it’s about right tool to right problem. It’s also about subjective preference, DX and all.
But can’t shake off that feeling of how I was duped by merchants of complexity in JS land.
Comments
I took a Rails course in college, and I too wish I’d kept up with it. But I didn’t have an immediate use for it and the knowledge smoldered and died. For a moment, I was one of the cool kids.
@drodol Yeah I think Django/Python belongs to the same category of mature, stable tech as Rails! Still good choice, and if it works for you it works.
@Winkletter Dude you still are, with your App A Day and all 💪
Sometimes I wish I had stuck with Rails. It has a great community and cool libraries. But I am not sorry about Django and certainly not about Python. I think Rails and Django are cool cousins.