Archives

I recently ran into an issue building an app which hit an existing (protected) website. Passing credentials along with each request, responses at first appeared to be cached, even after the user credentials changed from within the iPhone app. In sorting through this issue, it gave me a chance to get a bit more familiar with NSURLRequest, and NSURLRequestCachePolicy. As I later found, however, my problem turned out to be cookie-related..

Share/Bookmark

ActiveRecord comes with a lot of nice things that aren’t really dependent on having a database backed model. The most obvious example of this is the validation framework baked into ActiveRecord. Also, there are several plugins which add some useful behavior to ActiveRecord objects but don’t rely on having a database.

In the future, I believe the rails team aims to make certain things more modular and easier to pull out and use separately from ActiveRecord (validation being one of those). However, if you are working on a project which is locked into a certain version of rails or you’re impatient, there is a very simple plugin which can solve your needs.

Enter acts_without_database…

Share/Bookmark

If you read one or more of the Pathfinder blogs in our web interface, you may have noticed some tweaks to our navigation and top-level categories. Our goal in making these changes was to help different audiences drill down to the specific content that interests them. Instead of just a few top-level categories, we now boast around 20, though many posts appear in multiple categories. To subscribe via RSS to any specific category – or to our entire feed – just visit our Feeds page.

Share/Bookmark

Rosenfeld Media contacted me after I published my review of Luke Wroblewski’s “Web Form Design: Filling in the Blanks.” They offered Agile Ajax readers 10% off “Web Form Design” or any other purchase at rosenfeldmedia.com. To redeem, simply enter the code PATHFINDER at checkout.

Share/Bookmark

It looks like the Rails news for 2008 will be dominated by the impending cats-and-dogs merger of Merb and Rails. More on that next week.

Right now, here’s some links back to Rails content that our team has put out during 2008 that’s still useful, or that I just plain still like. I think a lot of people reading this came to our blog during 2008, so much of this might be new to you. Enjoy.

Fun stuff

• Lesser Known Test Processes: This is a look at the test development processes that we all do even when we know we shouldn’t. I had a lot of fun presenting a version of this post at WindyCityRails.
• A Rails Story or An Engine That Really Could Honestly, I just love repeating this story…

The Legacy Posts

Two posts about managing the complicated problem of taking over a project with pre-existing data or code.

• Using ActiveRecord to Migrate Legacy Data
• Dealing With a Legacy

Working with ActiveRecord

A couple of tips for doing weird stuff with ActiveRecord

• Using the Null Object Pattern With ActiveRecord 3/4
• Using ActiveRecord and metaprogramming to Define Constants for Enumerated Types

RailsConf 2008

I was there this year, and I even wrote a blog post.

• Welcome to RailsConf
• RailsConf 2008: A Belated Look Back

The Named Scope Duology

Somehow, I just knew that calling this post “Named Scopes Are Awesome” would get at least a little bit of attention…

• Named Scopes Are Awesome
• More Named Scope Awesomeness

Controllers and Views

Personally, I’m still looking around for the perfect solution to structuring views.

• Pretty Blocks In Rails Views
• DRYing Up Rails Controllers: Polymorphic and Super Controllers
• I’m Cranky Because I’m Not Getting Enough REST
• Helpers and Partials

Style

Who doesn’t love a good argument about style?

• Elements of Ruby Style
• Ruby Stylista
• Ruby On Rails Style Guide This is the most current version, incorporating the first two links.
• Rails Worst Practices: 13 Coding Nightmares You Should Avoid (Josh 12/10)
  

Security Testing

And a couple of quick posts about how to manage security testing in your Rails application

• Roles Testing For Security
• Testing Various Roles in Ruby On Rails

Share/Bookmark

Recently I’ve been working on a Flex prototype using the PureMVC framework. I will talk at length another time about just how much PureMVC successfully solves a lot of problems that we encounter in interface development and especially about how much this framework is important for all those complex interactions that we expect out of our RIA interfaces.

Starting out with PureMVC is not a particularly easy task. It is a good thing that there are decent documentation and examples, at least for AS3. At first when I read the documentation, it made sense only on a high level, but translating that high level understanding to code right away was out of the question. I solved this initial sticking point by looking at a couple of AS3 examples like CafeTownsend and EmployeeAdmin, where you can see how the framework works on the right size demo app, not too big and not too small.

Share/Bookmark

Agile Software development is all about the feedback loop. Do a little bit of something, get a little bit of feedback, change what you are doing if the feedback tells you so. There’s all sorts of feedback loops in a typical agile development process, from the automated, like TDD and continuous integration, to the biological, like user testing. If one of these loops breaks down, you are in for trouble.

Which is the biggest problem? No question: the lazy stakeholder or client. By lazy, I mean those unwilling to participate in evaluating the software after every iteration. The ideal client with install the software in their environment (web or desktop), kick the tires, try to do their jobs with it, do some informal user testing with colleagues or friends. Bug reports and tweaks will flood in (you do have a defect tracking system, don’t you?) and be scheduled for future iterations. More serious problems, such as a wrong or missing business requirement, will also be caught early this way. Early means cheaper. Early means better.

Share/Bookmark

This ends week one of my investigations into PureMVC. So far I’m impressed with the framework itself in it’s many versions and incarnations, but the documentation and tutorials for platforms other than Flex leave something to be desired. To all those folks that claim that Cairngorm is easier to learn than PureMVC, I can agree, but only because of this lack of good documentation.

So what should we Java/GWT developers do? Taking a cue from my colleague Noel Rappin, we should Read the Source, Luke. This code reading is a triangulation excercise worthy of Bill Clinton, involving API docs, source in other languages and source in other versions and platforms.

Share/Bookmark

Usability and design guru Luke Wroblewski knows that web forms suck. More importantly, he knows why – and how to make them suck less.

For the past few years, the Yahoo! product design exec has been presenting his ongoing research into the humble HTML form at conferences and on his blog, Functioning Form. I attended Wroblewski’s presentation at An Event Apart Chicago 2007 and came away super-impressed. His persuasive mixture of case studies, existing research and newly commissioned usability studies helped shed light on the patterns and anti-patterns that determine whether users successfully complete your forms or give up in disgust.

All of Wroblewski’s preparation came to fruition earlier this year when he published “Web Form Design: Filling in the Blanks” (Rosenfeld Media). After finally taking the time to read the book cover to cover, I’m mad at myself for waiting so long.

Share/Bookmark

Live from my laptop, it’s Rails Source!

After you’ve gotten the hang of Rails basics, one of the fastest ways to make the leap to black-belt Rails Warrior is to become familiar with the Rails source itself. (This remains a huge side-benefit of writing about Rails — there’s nothing like the prospect of making mistakes in public that drives somebody to extra research.)

The Rails source is arguably the most scrutinized piece of Ruby code going, so in addition to learning how Rails works, the Rails source can also help you pick up on Ruby tricks (the Rails source sold me on class << self to define a bunch of class methods), and generally give insight on how to structure large Ruby programs.

While you can get some feel for the Rails source from RDoc, there is still a lot of value in browsing the actual source files to get a feel for the connections between the different pieces in Rails.

Here’s a guide to browsing the Rails source tree (based on Edge Rails as of today, Dec 19, 2008).

Share/Bookmark