Way back in April our coach, Jessica, had organized Rails Girls LA. Jen was coaching and Joyce was in attendance. Joyce really connected with her pair and coach while Jen was inspired by the new crew of women.
Post Rails Girls workshop, we were both part of the same weekly Ruby/Rails study group which really kept us rolling. It’s nice to have people tell you to calm your horses when you have freak out moments. A few of us started working on an app. together when the word went out about RGSoC.
As part of the Bundler core team, Jessica already had Bundler in mind as a project so we jumped at her offer. This allowed us to take what we already knew and apply it to a real open-source project, one small edit at a time. We were happy to get the opportunity to delve more into coding with the help of a coach and mentor!
We ended up working on the most used gem in Ruby/Rails: Bundler! It is not glamorous, but very important. It is probably something you don’t even think about much past bundle install or bundle update because it is just part of the fabric of Rails. In the dark ages of Rails, developers would have to stand in the snow, manually installing the dependent gems for each project and then hope their project didn’t fail as gems were updated to newer versions. Now bundler “magically” makes sure everything is working in your favor. We have been working to help keep that seamless effect still seem magical.
We have worked on the bundler website, http://bundler.io, to make the documentation easier to access and to read. Lately we have been working on adding features and fixing problems that users have encountered. One of the happiest moments was seeing our fixes merged into Bundler! It is incredibly satisfying especially our first merges! Our mentor Andre Arko has also been incredibly helpful in our pursuits. Plus, he gave us awesome Bundler t-shirts when we met him at the Distill conference in San Francisco. Thanks so much to everyone who has made this possible. XO Rails Girls LA - Team Bundler
37signals creates and maintains web-based applications for collaboration, project management, and information sharing. In their own words, they build ‘frustration-free web-based apps for collaboration, sharing information, and making decisions.’ They proudly work backed by their customers and buyers and without any external funding.
But beyond developing applications to help us get things done, they maintain a popular company blog and job board, write insightful books, and their developers contribute regularly to various open source projects.
Productivity on Rails
In 2004, 37 Signals launched Basecamp, a web based project management app. Since then they have focused on building productivity applications, like Highrise, a CRM app; or Campfire, a business oriented online chat service. These apps are used by millions of freelancers and smaller and bigger businesses around the world (including myself!). Their apps are the white T-Shirt of web apps: uncomplicated, neat and clean and always a fit.
In 2004, they made public Ruby on Rails, an open-source framework that was created by David Heinemeier Hansson for the Basecamp project that they had been using internally for a while. Without this Random Act of Kindness we wouldn’t be here today. The maintenance of Rails is now in the hands of the Rails Core Team with the assistance of the rest of the Rails Community.
Sharing is caring
37 Signals sponsor Ruby on Rails and other projects, like our Rails Girls Summer of Code, and play their part in fixing the job crisis by helping programmers and other smart people to find a job.
In their free time (I’ve never been good at maths but something doesn’t seem right) Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson also wrote two books: REWORK, a must read if you’re thinking of getting into business or already working on a project; and Getting Real, a great (and free) handbook for building web apps that shows the full picture and is written in plain English.
If you plan to spend a while in the world of technology, these are some good guys to learn from and look up to. Join us in sending them a lot of mental thumbs up!
We have been offered no less than 49 free tickets at some of the best Ruby conferences on 3 different continents. Behold, the conferences that so kindly sponsored tickets to their events (and in some cases even flight tickets!) for our Summer of Code participants:
##Upcoming:
###SoCoded
September 19-20, Hamburg
Learn & hack for 2 days at SoCoded, with top notch international speakers and 150 fellow web developers. SoCoded brings together the best of Ruby, Python, JavaScript, PHP in Hamburg.
Plus:Team Hackety Hack and Team D* will be at SoCoded!
###BubbleConf
September 27, AmsterdamBubbleConf aims to inspire you to reach for the stars. It’s about Design, Technology, and above all Entrepreneurship. And: Henrietta - part of the global Rails Girls team - and yours truly share a speaking slot! Also Anika will pour all her Rails Girls Summer of Code story telling qualities into a lightning talk.
###Ruby Shift
September 27—28, Kiev
This year will be the 4th time RubyShift takes place, an independent non-profit conference on Ruby and satellite technologies with accent on making new friends, being inspired, and having fun.
MeetTeam Spree Girls, Team D*, Team inchworms and Team Highway to Rails at Ruby Shift!
###Arrrrcamp
October 3-4, Ghent
A 2-day, dual track Ruby, Rails and web related conference with plenty of good speakers, loads of free rum and a free pirate twist. That sure sounds like Arrrrcamp!
MeetTeam Oana and Team Unicorn there!
Quite probably the awesomest conference logo EVER!
###Rails Israel
October 9, Tel AvivRails Israel is best described watching this YouTube video. Tel Aviv bringing you Rails awesomeness, garanteed!
Meet: Team Highway to Railsin Israel!
###RuPy
October 11-13, BudapestRuPy is a unique conference that brings together communities from different state-of-the-art programming languages Ruby, Python, JavaScript, Clojure and related technologies.
MeetTeam Spree Girls in Budapest!
###Wicked Good Ruby
October 12-13, BostonWicked Good Ruby is a two day, double track Ruby conference at the Seaport World Trade Center in Boston. AND: it’s Boston’s first annual Ruby conf!
MeetTeam Unicorn at Wicked Good Ruby!
###dotRBeu
October 18, ParisdotRBeu is the largest Ruby conference in France and truly a conference made by developers for developers, with exceptional speakers on stage, like the maintainers of the most popular Ruby projects, the implementors of Ruby runtimes, … Just great hackers all-around. There will also be a Workshop Day on October 19!
MeetTeam Species+, Team inchworms and Highway to Railsin Paris!
###FutureStack
October 24-25, San FranciscoFutureStack is: “tomorrow and the day after—and right now—all at the same time”. Join your fellow Sys Admins, Leads, Devs, and Data Analysts and learn how FutureStack will help revolutionize the world you’re helping to create!
###StarTechConf
October 25-26, Santiago
Don’t miss out on what is advertised to be the greatest tech event in Chile: StarTechConf. The conference brings together world renowned stars in software development and local tech experts to talk about HTML5, CSS3, JavaScript, Ruby, Java, Python, Mobile and much more.
MeetTeam Punchgirls in Santiago!
##Awww, such good times we had at…
###Distill
August 8-9, San FranciscoDistill developer conference featured over 25 speakers (like Summer of Code coach Konstantin Haase) showcasing best practices from application architecture and user experience to testing and security.
Team Bundler attended the SF conference.
###JRubyConf
August 14-15, BerlinJRubyConf is a two-day, single track conference, completely devoted to JRuby. This year JRubyConf celebrated its second birthday.
Team Spree Girls and Team D* were at JRubyConf.
###Eurucamp
August 16-18, Berlineurucamp 2013 was far more than a conference: a week of Ruby goodness in Berlin. Geek camp ftw! The days before the conferences were an official part of the program, with activities planned for locals and first-time Berlin visitors alike.
Team Spree Girls and Team RailsGrrls attended eurucamp!
Rails Girls Berlin
###Madison Ruby Conference
August 23-24, MadisonMadison Ruby Conference did a pretty awesome job bringing together two great communities showcasing the assets of the local Ruby community and allowing Madison visitors a chance to experience one of the best, brainiest, and least-expensive places in the United States to live and work. Plus: Madison Ruby Conference hosted a RailsBridge Womens Outreach Workshop!
Team Hackety Hack and Team Unicorn were at the Madison conference.
###CSSconf.eu
September 13, BerlinCSSconf.eu is a conference dedicated to the designers, developers and engineers who build the world’s most engaging user interfaces. From the community, for the community. Our design heroes Lisa and Rebecca attended CSSconf.eu.
###The Strange loop
September 18-20, St.LouisStrange Loop is a multi-disciplinary conference that aimed to bring together the developers and thinkers building tomorrow’s technology. And boy, did they succeed!
Team New Rosies was at The Strange Loop.
Our friends at Phusion and Nedap announced on Wednesday that they’re giving away tickets to Bubbleconf to Rails Girls (Summer of Code) alumni & supporters! We had a jury go through the crazy pictures you guys tweeted. And the winners are:
If you want to make sure to get a ticket for BubbleConf, you can also buy one via http://bubbleconf.com. Students only pay EU 60 (incl. VAT) per ticket, and Standard Tickets are EU 300 (incl. VAT) a piece. For Rails Girls members however, we’re able to provide a nearly 50% discount on the Standard Ticket pricing, making them EU 160 (incl. VAT) per ticket. You can order these tickets via https://bubbleconf2013.paydro.net/event/bubbleconf-2013/railsgirls!
SoundCloud is a long and dear friend of Rails Girls, especially here in Berlin.
Right from the first workshop, the guys and gals supported us. With their help it was, amongst others, possible to arrange a thank you dinner for our coaches or get a band for the legendary winter party of Rails Girls Berlin. And there’s even more: Duana, working as a software engineer at SoundCloud, is a coach since the very beginning up until now, where she’s coaching Team RailsGrrls at the Soundcloud office. She also encouraged other SoundCloud developers to help raise the next generation of programmers.
SoundCloud is a social sound platform where you can create or upload your own music or anything sound-related for that matter and then share it with the rest of the world. It all started off with music, the heart of Soundcloud. By now, the simple way of distributing sound files made it a great place-to-be for storytellers, teachers and artists, too.
We want to say THANK YOU!!! ♥
###A Summer of Code Mixtape
But that’s only the beginning. As the saying goes: A song is worth a thousand words. And a mixtape is a wonderful novel.
We are putting together a SoundCloud “Rails Girls Summer of Code Mixtape”.
Everybody who participated in Rails Girls Summer of Code can send her or his favorite “Summer Coding Song” to us via tweet. Like this one, for example:
Here’s that snippet again:
“Hi @RailsGirlsSoC here is my song from @SoundCloud for the #rgsocMixtape: “
We are going to collect all of the wonderful pieces here and together we will create the sound of this fantastic summer. Great? Great! Let’s go!
SoundCloud is a long and dear friend of Rails Girls, especially here in Berlin.
