In part 2 we coded our PDF generator as a background job. But the PDF is still being stored on the local file system. Let’s store it in S3 instead and give our users a URL so they can download it. First let’s add the AWS SDK gem to our … Continue reading
In part 1 we learned why backgrounding is important. Now let’s dive into some code. First things first. Add wicked_pdf and delayed_job to your Gemfile: Now we can generate a PDF from inside our Rails app with this simple command: You’ll notice that the more complex the HTML, the longer … Continue reading
What do you get when you combine the slick PDF generation capabilities of wicked_pdf with the elegance and efficiency of delayed_job? A high performance way to convert HTML pages into beautiful PDF documents. I’ve been leveraging wicked_pdf to generate high school transcripts from my SaaS app, Teascript, since 2009. Prior … Continue reading
Thanks to everyone who turned out for my API talk at the Triangle Ruby Brigade. I wasn’t expecting such a large crowd and the resulting Q&A was really good. It was interesting hearing how other developers are using APIs in their projects, and what problems they are encountering and solving. … Continue reading
If you’ll be in or near Raleigh the evening of March 12th, consider dropping by the Triangle Ruby Brigade. I’ll be presenting on how to build HTTP-based APIs in Rails, including: Creating an API controller Wiring up versioned routes for your API Protecting your API with authentication Choosing a transport … Continue reading
Continuing from part 1 of the recap, here are the remaining six talks I attended during RubyConf in Denver: Y Not – Adventures in Functional Programming by Jim Weirich Jim’s presentations never disappoint and this was no exception. Similar to his prior talk where he built Git from scratch, except … Continue reading
After being unable to attend RubyConf last year, I was thrilled when I heard that this year’s conference would be held in Denver. Having lived in Boulder for several years, I’ve learned to love Colorado, the scenery, and the people. So it was almost a given that I would be … Continue reading
This year’s Ruby Hoedown was at the Scarritt Bennet Center in Nashville. Per his usual, Jeremy McAnally organized a top-notch, free, two day regional Ruby conference that was a pleasure to attend. A lot of work goes into organizing this type of thing. I doff my proverbial hat to Jeremy … Continue reading
I’ll be presenting on A/B testing at tonight’s raleigh.rb meetup. As developers, we use tools like RSpec and Cucumber to verify that our application is functional, but how can we verify that the layout of our home page is user-friendly? How can we determine the ideal size for our signup … Continue reading
One of the Rails apps I’ve been working on formats times as HH:MM in the view. No seconds are displayed. This is a pretty common way to format things. When doing timestamp comparisons in SQL, however, the seconds are taken into account. This is bad since it can cause discrepancies … Continue reading