Sessions at RailsConf 2009 about Ruby on Rails

Monday 4th May 2009

• Building a Mini-Google: High-Performance Computing in Ruby

  by Ilya Grigorik

  High-performance computing may not be Ruby’s strength on the surface, but there is a great number of gems and third party packages which are often overlooked when it comes to this topic. We will assume no prior knowledge of PageRank (Google’s ranking algorithm) and will walk through the basic theory and computational challenges behind it. Along the way, we will look at a hands on example of computing PageRank for a 1-million page web, and the tools behind it:

  • Ruby GSL – Working with GNU Scientific Library
  • Linalg – Ruby Linear Algebra
  • NArray – Numerical Ruby
  • And others…

  As a bonus, you’ll find that the ideas behind PageRank are surprisingly simple and powerful (no math-wiz certification required) and can be easily applied to many existing social and content networks – better recommendations, search, and discovery.

  • Google
  • Ruby
  • Ruby on Rails
  • Search

  On Monday 4th May

  Coverage slide deck

Thursday 7th May 2009

• Rails Core Panel

  by David Heinemeier Hansson, Jeremy Kemper, Michael Koziarski, Rick Olson and Yehuda Katz

  Q&A with the core developers of Rails. Your questions; their answers.

  • Ruby on Rails

  At 3:10pm to 4:00pm, Thursday 7th May

  Coverage video

Unscheduled

• Rails and Legacy Databases

  by Brian P. Hogan

  • Databases
  • Ruby on Rails

• Rails Metal, Rack and Sinatra

  by Adam Wiggins

  Rails 2.3 introduces a hot new feature: Rails Metal. Metal allows you to build Rack endpoints for selected URLs in your app. Optimize your high-frequency, low-complexity actions with Rails Metal and get a 2x – 3x performance boost.

  Even better: you can use Sinatra, the microframework that everyone’s talking about, from Rails Metal. Capture the speed and elegance of Sinatra from within your existing Rails app!

  This talk will provide a brief overview of the basics of Rack and Sinatra, so no prior knowledge of either project is required.

  • Rack
  • Ruby on Rails
  • Sinatra
  Coverage slide deck

• The Even Darker Art of Rails Engines

  by James Adam

  When I started talking about the idea of ‘Rails Engines’ a few years ago, everyone thought I was crazy. Some people said it was stupid, or just plain evil. Despite that, the ability to write simple yet powerful plugins is baked into the core of Rails 2.3.

  But heed the words of Uncle Ben: “With great power, comes great responsibility!”

  In this session, we’ll discuss how to best take advantage of ‘engines’, in which situations engine plugins are appropriate and those where they aren’t, and how to avoid some of the common issues that can arrive when developing with engine-style plugins.

  When we’re done, you’ll be in the best position to take advantage of this newly-sanctified functionality in your own projects.

  • Rails Engines
  • Ruby on Rails
  Coverage slide deck