Ruby for Web Development
Beyond just Rails

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The Big Gorilla

A Myriad of Options
Mack
Camping
Sinatra

The Heart of Them All

So, What’s What?

require 'camping'
Camping.goes :Blog
module Blog::Models
class Post < Base; belongs_to :user; end
class Comment < Base; belongs_to :user; end
class User < Base; end
end
Camping module Blog::Controllers
class Index
def get
@posts = Post.find :all
• Microframework (under 4K) render :index
end
end
• Single file applications end
• MVC-ish module Blog::Views
def layout
html do
head { title "My Blog" }
body do
h1 "My Blog"
self << yield
GOTCHAS end
end
• ActiveRecord needed for end
Models def index
for post in @posts
• Markaby needed for Views h1 post.title
end
end
end

Sinatra
• Web Application DSL
require 'sinatra'
• Single file applications possible get '/' do
'Hello world!'
• Non-MVC/MVC-ish end
GOTCHAS
• Additional dependencies for
data persistence (Models)
• Additional dependencies for
Views & Templates

require 'ramaze'
• Modular Web Framework
class MainController < Ramaze::Controller
• Single file applications possible def index
"Hello, World!"
end
• MVC-ish end
• ORM & Templating Agnostic
Ramaze.start
GOTCHAS
• Less visible community

Mack
• Lightweight framework
• Inspired by Rails, Merb and
Ramaze
• Emphasis on speed
• Multithreaded
GOTCHAS
• Limited user community
• Very limited documentation

• Everything and the kitchen sink
• The Ruby Web Standard
• Emphasis on “Developer
Happiness”
• HUGE community
GOTCHAS
• Monolithic
• Opinionated

So, What Is Rack?

• Standard abstraction for web
applications
class HelloWorld
• Super flexible thanks to
def call(env)
[200,
Middleware {"Content-Type" => "text/plain"},
["Hello world!"]]
•
end
Stupid simple end
• Makes your app/framework
web server agnostic

Middlewares
• Middlewares are Rack applications that you stack together to form a
larger app
• Rails is composed of numerous pieces of Rack Middleware
• Middlewares respond to call, accept an environment hash and return
a response array
• Examples of Rack Middleware
• Rack::Static - Handles fetching and returning static assets or caches
• Rack::Session::Cookie - Handles your sessions via cookies
• Rack::ShowExceptions - Catches any exceptions thrown in your app
and returns a useful backtrace on the exception.

More Resources
• 32 Rack Links and Resources (Ruby Inside) - http://bit.ly/2NTV4Z
• 21 Rack Middlewares (Ruby Inside) - http://bit.ly/4uyXYW
• Rails on Rack (Rails Guides) - http://bit.ly/C9zZP
• Rack Middleware (Railscasts) - http://bit.ly/okQoF
• Rack Screencasts (Ruby Flow) - http://bit.ly/4AMeuP

Questions?