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Peter Bhat Harkins
Rails Day 2006
I’m sort of participating in Rails Day 2006. I say “sorta” because I’m trying to build an app in one day but I’m not actually in the competition.
The biggest reason I’m not officially participating is that contestants are required to use their Subversion server. I’d still have my code at the end of the day, but I wouldn’t have any of my version-control metadata. That’s totally unacceptable. I’ll want to be able to rewind to old commits, check out my log messages, all that good stuff. They seem like cool folks and I could probably mail them and ask for a dump, but version control is one of the few places I’m completely risk averse. A chance at a laptop simply isn’t worth the hassle, delay, and risk.
It’s plain coincidence that I’m developing a Rails app today. I saw Rails Day a few weeks ago and forgot about it and wasn’t reminded until after their registration deadline. (Why is there even a deadline? Who cares whether a participant signs up a week before it starts or six hours into it?)
I’m coding a Rails app today because I finished the tutorial in Agile Web Development With Rails (2nd ed) earlier this week and I need a practice project. I’m going to completely revamp malaprop.org into a personal portfolio. I’ve been meaning to do it for months, so it lept out at me when I looked through my TODO file for a well-bounded project.
In case anyone is wondering “Hey, Peter, you crazy Python-lover, what’s all this about Rails?” I’ll explain a little. I’m going to start up a web-based game and when I evaluated frameworks, Rails was the clear winner for my requirements. Sorry to tease, but that’s all I’m going to post about it at the moment. If you’re curious, just watch this space over the next few weeks.