Rails and AWS at Meducation

A 30min talk given at Startup Engineering 2013 on how to choose technology for a startup, and why we use Ruby on Rails and AWS at Meducation.

Transcript

1. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Rails  and  AWS   Jeremy  Walker     @iHiD  
2. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Hello!  
3. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   I’m  Jeremy  Walker  (iHiD)   Chief  Technical  Officer   MeducaLon  
4. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Long  Lme  Rails  developer.  
5. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Long  Lme  Rails  advocate.  
6. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   UQerly  biased.  
7. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD  
8. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Startups  are  about  execuLng  an   idea  quickly.  
9. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Startups  are  not  about  making  cool  tech     (unless  your  startup  is  about     making  cool  tech!)  
10. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Tech  helps  your  startup.  It  doesn’t   determine  its  fate.  
11. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Startup  Life.  
12. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Startup  Life.  
13. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Lean  Startup  
14. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Lean  technology  choices  
15. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Minimal  Viable  Products  (MVPs)  
16. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   The  key  to  everything  is  the   freedom  to  pivot.  
17. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Flexibility,  speed  and  freedom.  
18. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Freedom  to  make  mistakes  
19. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Freedom  to  throw  code  away  
20. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   The  tech  should  give  you  that   freedom.  
21. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Quick  to  develop  in.  
22. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Low  investment  to  make  stuff.  
23. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   A  technology  you  know  well.  
24. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   A  technology  you  can     hire  people  for.  
25. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Rails   PHP  Devs?  
26. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Rails   Java  /  .NET  Devs?  
27. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Birmingham  doesn’t  have  a  huge   amount  of  devs.     Choose  your  tech  carefully…  
28. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Scala,  Rails  –  nice  techs.  Not  very   many  devs.  
29. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Ruby  on  Rails  
30. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   “A  dynamic,  open  source  programming   language  with  a  focus  on  simplicity  and   producLvity.  It  has  an  elegant  syntax  that   is  natural  to  read  and  easy  to  write.”  
31. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Ruby  has  shocking  Thread  support.  
32. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Matz  -­‐  “Not  a  threading  guy”  
33. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   “Ruby  on  Rails  is  an  open-­‐source  web   framework  that's  opLmized  for   programmer  happiness  and   sustainable  producLvity.”  
34. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   “WriQen  in  Ruby,  Rails  lets  you  write   beauLful  code  by  favoring  convenLon   over  configuraLon.”  
35. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   “The  result  is  a  web  framework  that   allows  you  to  transiLon  from  idea  to   implementaLon  in  a  very  short  period   of  Lme.”  
36. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Rails  is  fast  to  develop  in.  
37. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   ConvenLon  over  configuraLon.  
38. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Famous  for  Scaffolding  
39. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   rails  g  scaffold  books  
40. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Generators.  
41. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   AcLveRecord.  
42. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Eco  System  of  Gems.  
43. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Open  Source.  
44. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Community.  
45. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Concentrate  on  the  bits  you  NEED  to   write.  Use  the  community  to     write  the  rest  for  you.  
46. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   AWS.  
47. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Quick.  
48. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Cheap.  
49. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Scalable.  
50. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Need  to  learn  almost  nothing  new  if   you’ve  worked  with  a  server  before.  
51. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   EC2  is  familiar.  
52. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   RDS  handles  DB  backups.  
53. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   S3  won’t  lose  your  files.  
54. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   CloudFront  makes  file  serving  fast.  
55. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Route53  makes  DNS  easy.  
56. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Cloudfront  makes  file  serving  fast.  
57. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   CloudSearch  is  basically  hosted   Lucene.  So  simple  to  use.  
58. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   SNS/SQS  make  pub/sub  very  easy.  
59. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   LimitaLons.  
60. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Ruby’s  not  fast.  
61. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Rails  does  scale.  But  it  involves  more   effort  that  other  langauges/ frameworks.  
62. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   AWS  can  be  a  liQle  overwhelming.  
63. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Heroku.  
64. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Insanely  simple  to  set  up.  
65. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Instantly  scale.  
66. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Gets  expensive  quickly.  
67. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Using  Ruby  and  AWS?   Try  Propono,  InquisiLo,  Pavor,  Filum.  
68. Startup  Engineering  2013   @iHiD   Jeremy  Walker  (iHiD)   Chief  Technical  Officer   MeducaLon