Narrative reflections: turning Ruby code into storytelling gold

Transcript

1. Narrative reflections: transmuting Ruby code into storytelling gold Travis Turner Editor, Evil Martians
2. How to begin this talk?
3. About Creative Writing Degrees
6. RITE AID parking lot, sometime in 2014
7. RITE AID parking lot, sometime in 2014
8. #2 Context Who are you speaking to? What do they need to know?
10. The EM Writing Way: •Not required •Freedom + Creativity •Value/interesting for readers •Developer/author happiness
11. The EM Writing Way: •Not required •Freedom + Creativity •Value/interesting for readers •Developer/author happiness
17. Why bother? A very brief case for writing
18. •Contributing to the community •Connecting with friends/like-minded people •Finding contributors for your open source •Fame •Promoting your product •Sharing your product •Skill development •Career development •Documentation •Future-proo fi ng your career
21. Let’s get locked in for writing
22. #1 Recognition and collection Recognize when something is interesting to you, valuable, or just just worth your attention in some way. Collect the relevant artifacts.
23. #1 Experience Reading how someone solved a problem or implemented a feature can be both enlightening and inspiring. Plus, it’s unique to you.
24. “In this post, I’d like to share my fi rst experience with packaging a Ruby program (Ruby Next) into Wasm via ruby.wasm and making it available online.”
26. #2 Gems, features, products in other words, something you want to share.
27. Skooma: a Ruby library for validating API implementations against OpenAPI documents.
28. AnyCable: realtime server for reliable two-way communication.
29. #3 You think something should be a certain way
30. Technical meetups offer something so real and unique, and are truly the best way to connect with people who have similar passions. So, let’s bring them back! As a practical example, let me summarize how we organized one of our recent events: our SF Bay Area Ruby meetup.
31. #4 Etc. Setups, cool stu ff , or anything you fi nd valuable or interesting.
32. Sharing a con fi guration / setup / toolkit
33. Sharing a con fi guration / setup / toolkit
34. Sharing an experiment / something cool
35. Writing about your book
36. #1 Recognition and collection Recognize when something is interesting to you, valuable, or just just worth your attention in some way. Collect the relevant artifacts.
49. Story: •Beginning •Middle •End
50. #2 Context Who are you speaking to? What they need to know?
51. #3 Read aloud
52. “There was a wisteria vine blooming for the second time that summer on a wooden trellis before one window, into which sparrows came now and then in random gusts, making a dry vivid dusty sound before going away: and opposite Quentin, Miss Cold fi eld in the eternal black which she had worn for forty-three years now, whether for sister, father, or nothusband none knew, sitting so bolt upright in the straight hard chair that was so tall for her that her legs hung straight and rigid as if she had iron shinbones and ankles, clear of the fl oor with that air of impotent and static rage like children’s feet, and talking in that grim haggard amazed voice until at last listening would renege and hearing-sense self-confound and the long-dead object of her impotent yet indomitable frustration would appear, as though by outraged recapitulation evoked, quiet inattentive and harmless, out of the biding and dreamy and victorious dust.” — William Faulkner
53. #4 Think of the work as a whole. You want to get a feel for the full text.
54. Edit • Iterate • Refactor • Debug
55. Edit Find a friend or co-worker, or wait for “fresh eyes”.
56. #5 Edit Cut stu ff out.
57. #5 Edit Cut stu ff out.
58. Pitfalls, …or as I like to call em’: sinkholes
59. DO NOT WORRY HORSE WAS RESCUED!!!!!!!!
60. #1 “Caring” too much / Overthinking
61. #2 “I don’t know how to write”
62. #2 “I don’t know how to write”
63. #2 “I don’t know how to write”
64. #3 Going too big out the gate
65. #4 “I don’t have enough time” / a “thank you” slide
66. Challenges in the future…
67. rubyflow.com r/ruby r/rails Sharing your work
68. evilmartians.com/blog
69. Parting thoughts
72. Actual parting thoughts