Look, you're going to go write a bunch of weird, crazy, and quite possibly criminally insane code in Ruby at some point or another in your career. Maybe you already have. I can't stop you, and I'd be disappointed if you didn't at least try, so in this talk I'll show you how to do it without poking your own eye out with the pointy end of a sharpened stick.

1. Advanced Ruby Idioms So Clean
You Can Eat Off Of Them
Brian Guthrie
bguthrie@thoughtworks.com
http://twitter.com/bguthrie

3. What this talk is about

4. “magic”
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cayusa/2962437091/

5. encouraging you to try things

6. preventing you from poking
yourself with the sharp end of a
pointed stick

7. magic

8. magic

9. technical understanding

10. design maturity

11. What this talk is not about

12. trying to stop you

13. explaining why

14. Who this talk is for

15. Who this talk is for
0-6 months 6-12 months 12-36 months 36+ months

16. Who this talk is for
0-6 months 6-12 months 12-36 months 36+ months
total
noob sauce

17. Who this talk is for
0-6 months 6-12 months 12-36 months 36+ months
total hardened
noob sauce ruby veteran

18. Who this talk is for
0-6 months 6-12 months 12-36 months 36+ months
total a danger to yourself hardened
noob sauce and others ruby veteran

19. Who this talk is for
0-6 months 6-12 months 12-36 months 36+ months
total a danger to yourself hardened
noob sauce and others ruby veteran
You know who you are.

20. Who this talk is for
0-6 months 6-12 months 12-36 months 36+ months
total thick controllers
total lack of curiousity
noob sauce (total noob sauce)

21. ask questions anytime
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jonnya/4212907371/

22. task:
build a custom validation framework

23. task:
build a custom validation framework
a danger to yourself
and others

32. Tip
Offload the heavy stuff to dedicated objects.
It’s worth the trouble.

38. Tip
Make sure your subclasses honor the behavior
of their superclasses.
It’s worth the trouble.

39. a brief detour
http://www.flickr.com/photos/garyseven/4434835473/

40. 6
(acceptable)
types of
Ruby
method signatures

41. 0

42. 1

43. 2

44. {}

45. 1{}

46. *

47. 0 1 2 H 1H *

48. 0 1 2 ... n

50. H 1H *

54. Tip
Stick to the Six Acceptable Ruby Method Signatures.
0, 1, 2, H, 1H, *

58. a danger to yourself
and others

62. Tip
Add behavior with
instance_eval or define_method,
not method_missing.

63. http://www.flickr.com/photos/suneko/389852016/
+
http://www.flickr.com/photos/contusion/4066189755/

64. validations anywhere!

66. >> Object.new.method :valid?
=> #<Method: Object#valid?>

68. >> Object.new.method :valid?
=> #<Method: Object(BrianRecord::Extensions::Validations::InstanceMethods)#valid?>

69. Tip
Modularize and name any extensions you build.
Some poor sucker, like me, has to maintain that thing.

70. Tip
Use self.included to leverage existing class behaviors.
Purely my own opinion.

71. a_very_bad_gem/lib/extensions/object/tap.rb

73. Tip
Extend respectfully:
Check for competing implementations.
Or I will hunt you down and slay you.

74. Tip
Write tests.

75. Write tests.

76. Write tests.

77. Write tests.

78. Write
tests.

79. Write
tests.

80. Write
tests.

81. Write
tests.

82. Write
tests.

83. Write
tests.

84. Write
tests.

85. YUM
RUBY WILL EAT YOU
YUM
http://www.flickr.com/photos/pandiyan/146700348/

86. http://www.flickr.com/photos/bunchofpants/52816417/

88. Brian Guthrie
bguthrie@thoughtworks.com
http://twitter.com/bguthrie
questions?