whateverthing.com

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Changes are afoot: I’ve been given the opportunity to learn Ruby on Rails on a project at work. It’s been a while since I started a new language, and my last attempt at Python kind of fizzled, so I’m hoping that Ruby will be easier to pick up.

So Far, So Good

I’ve had some exposure to Ruby in the past, such as with Puppet modules and Capistrano deployments, but until now I haven’t really concentrated on understanding the language itself. Compared to PHP, it’s lean and clean. I’m definitely liking what I’m seeing.

Recently I had a side project that needed Next/Previous pagination buttons. Using Twig, a PHP-based template rendering engine I like, I was able to hack together a quick and dirty solution. Emphasis on the dirty - but, even dirty code can teach you something.

In this case, we're going to learn a few Twig tricks: advanced for loops, array merging, and custom macros.

Let’s say you’re building a mobile app in Silex (a PHP microframework), and you want to add location-based search to your features. You’ve got a data set with a bunch of street addresses, like this CSV that lists all facilities in British Columbia that are licensed to sell or produce liquor.

A quick example:

Not that I’m thinking of creating a “nearest booze” app. I’ve got better things on my mind. Anyway, that’s off topic. Uh oh! Now I’ve decided to make the app.

I’m going to call it DrinkyDrinkyThing.

You’re probably familiar with the concept of Dogfooding - rolling out your products within your organization. The goal is to have many internal eyes on the products so employees will be empowered to fix pain points that bother them. It’s largely a successful idea, but it can be difficult to foster organization-wide adoption. This is especially true when trying to integrate a new product inside an established ecosystem.

In fact, mandating dogfooding practices can actually alienate your employees. In some cases, that very alienation is also a form of dogfooding - it gives your marketing and sales people an opportunity to pitch the product internally so they can brace themselves for the onslaught of the real world. They should embrace this opportunity to educate themselves about your own product’s market fit.

But what about the competition?

If you only use your own product, you’ll naturally fall into usage patterns that minimize pain points. This is what real-world users end up doing, and it can have a negative impact on your product’s perception in the marketplace.

Enter: Catfooding.