Left of the Dev

Articles tagged developer-experience

Old Ruby and Rails on new hardware with dev containers

How do you get an ancient Rails application running on newer hardware? Dev containers to the rescue! (April 15, 2025)

Newly open-sourced development setup tools

Recover from laptop disasters a little faster through automation! (March 09, 2025)

Notes on pair programming with Aider when Python isn't readily available

Here's how I'm using Aider as an AI pair programming buddy in dev containers, without dealing with Python (January 07, 2025)

Why I’ve started using justfiles in my Rails apps

Boost your developer experience with consistent command line interfaces. Here's how. (February 24, 2024)

Using devcontainers in GitHub Actions CI workflows

It's simpler than ever to wire CI pipelines, thanks to devcontainers. Here's how I run Rails test suites these days in GitHub workflows. (January 14, 2024)

A few things I've learned to simplify working in dev containers

I'm still learning as I go, but here are some tidbits I've learned so far about using dev containers for most of my software projects these days. (September 05, 2023)

Docker containers for Rails development environments, part 2: Setup

In our first experiment, let's see what it takes to get a Rails app to boot in a Visual Studio Code devcontainer. (February 21, 2021)

Docker containers for Rails development environments, part 1: Introduction

Let's experiment with building sensible devcontainers for Rails. Here's the plan. (February 14, 2021)

Test with confidence!

If you liked my series on practical advice for adding reliable tests to your Rails apps, check out the expanded ebook version. Lots of additional, exclusive content and a complete sample Rails application.

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