Rails Business

Brendan Buckingham & Ryan Frisch
  • 5.0 (1)
  • TECHNOLOGY
  • UPDATED BIWEEKLY

Brendan Buckingham and Ryan Frisch talk about developing with Ruby on Rails and how to leverage it to build a business.

  1. 11H AGO

    Scaling AI-Assisted Development

    Today we discuss lessons from our previous episode with John Nunemaker, focusing on the Conductor tool and how multi-workspace, multi-agent workflows can speed up coding and bug fixing. Brendan shares his experimenting with parallelizing six Rollbar error fixes at once by generating prompts and running them in separate Conductor workspaces. They compare this with a one-agent-at-a-time workflow and debate whether closed-loop setups (ports, databases, dependencies) could make parallel work trustworthy and reduce context-switching costs. They also cover using full Honeybadger/XML reports for faster debugging, using Claude Code from a phone to create PRs, challenges syncing session history, and broader AI product strategy like APIs/MCP, and RAG. 00:00 Catch Up And Recap 00:43 Conductor Workflow Overview 02:40 Parallel Rollbar Fixes 04:35 Manual Testing And Setup Hurdles 06:33 Debugging With Full Reports 08:46 Ports Docker And Dependencies 11:50 Parallelism Versus Focus 14:57 Closed Loop Trust And Context 18:24 Merge Conflicts And Acceptance Gaps 22:16 Review Bottleneck And Output Surge 25:26 Fixing Gallery Uploads 26:39 Multi Select Challenges 28:27 Branching Without Conductor 31:28 Claude Mobile Workflow 32:34 Session Sync Friction 34:44 AI Brain For SaaS 38:01 APIs And MCP Table Stakes 41:49 Internal AI Assistants 43:46 Access And Safety Concerns 46:31 Second Brain Revival 49:03 RAG Tooling Experiments 50:04 Wrap Up And Listener Feedback LINKS - Ryan's Website - Brendan's X/Twitter - Brendan's Bluesky Questions or comments, email us at railsbusinesspod@gmail.com Send us Fan Mail

    51 min

  2. MAR 5

    John Nunemaker on AI Development

    John Nunemaker returns to discuss how fast AI tooling has changed and argues tech leaders should adopt Claude Max (defaulting to Opus), set up agent-friendly local environments, and roll that out to their teams. He shares how his company built an internal “brain” using LibreChat as a self-hosted interface, enabling non-engineers to query company data and generate insights like weekly support summaries from various sources. The conversation also covers worktrees and Conductor for parallel, isolated dev environments. 01:22 Tech Leaders Must Adopt AI 02:31 Why Opus Changed Everything 04:55 Claude Max Plans and Limits 07:41 Brain Idea and Safety Boundaries 09:03 Building the Stack with MCP 10:18 Ansible Automation and Deploys 12:53 Support Data Summaries in LibreChat 15:42 Scheduling Reports to Slack 20:17 OpenCode vs Claude and Mobile Workflow 23:54 What MCP Connectors Enable 26:20 Accessing Brain via Tailscale 30:48 Team Size and PR Volume 32:32 Claude PR Review Workflow 35:25 Conductor Daily Setup 38:36 Worktrees and Isolation 50:47 Conductor Limits and Pain 51:36 App Changes and Scripts 54:45 Caddy for Local Domains 57:10 Jobs Outlook and Wrap Notes - John's X/Twitter - John's Bluesky - John's post setting up conductor with Rails - John's Website - Ryan's Website - Brendan's Bluesky Questions or comments, email us at railsbusinesspod@gmail.com Send a text

    58 min

  3. FEB 19

    Kyle Keesling

    In this episode, Kyle Keesling, co-owner of PASS Testing and long-time solo Rails developer, shares how PASS grew from a college web design side project into a niche software and training business for the Underground Storage Tank (UST) industry. The conversation covers why they kept the products as two apps connected by a read-only private API, what makes compliance software hard, and how they modeled flexible equipment and inspection data—evolving from STI to Rails delegated types. Kyle also discusses early scaling pains around billing and payments, how feature requests are prioritized with help from their CRO and a contractor, and how tools like Claude Code are changing his workflow while maintaining PR-based review and safer deployment practices. 00:00 Meet Kyle Keesling& His Role at PASS Testing 00:29 From College Web Design to a Niche Opportunity in UST Compliance 02:31 Building Opus: A Custom LMS for Gas Station Training 03:34 Why Compliance Is Hard: 50 States, 50 Rulebooks 04:25 From Training to Past Tools: The Second Product Idea 08:06 Two Apps or One? Data Sync, APIs, and Customer Workflows 10:25 Would He Do It Again? Decoupling, Upgrades, and Acquisition Optionality 12:28 Why Past Tools Is More Complex: Data-Driven Inspections & Asset Inventory 16:13 Modeling the Domain in Rails: STI → Delegated Types (and Migration Strategy) 22:35 Versioning & “Point-in-Time” Inspections: Preventing Old Reports from Changing 24:13 Downtime, SLAs, and Recovering from Form/Data Bugs 26:40 Early Scaling Stories: Hardcoding States and Billing Growing Pains 29:39 Letting Customers Shape the Product (Beyond Compliance) 31:14 Integrations vs. Building Everything In-House 32:50 Feature Requests, Backlog Triage, and Adding Sales/Dev Bandwidth 37:41 Shipping Without the Never-Ending PR: Iterative Rollouts ("Visits") 40:39 Using AI Safely: PRs, Branch Protections, and Documentation Habits 46:14 Wrap-Up: Where to Find Kyle and Past Testing LINKS - PASS Testing - Kyle's X/Twitter - Ryan's Website - Brendan's X/Twitter - Brendan's Bluesky Questions or comments, email us at railsbusinesspod@gmail.com Send a text

    47 min

  4. FEB 5

    Reflecting on Our First Year of the Podcast

    In this episode, the hosts reconnect after a holiday break to reflect on their podcast journey over the last year. They discuss important milestones like their one-year recording anniversary, the various episodes from the past year, and sharing their favorite moments. 00:00 Introduction and New Year Greetings 00:34 Reflecting on the First Year of Podcasting 01:57 Memorable Moments and Guest Highlights 03:51 Popular Episodes and Themes 06:38 Looking Forward: Future Topics and Guests 07:42 Balancing Guests and Solo Episodes 09:15 Podcast Growth and Marketing Insights 10:16 Commitment to Consistency and Goals 12:18 Exploring Business and Technical Challenges 27:46 Concluding Thoughts and Call for Guests LINKS - Ryan's Website - Brendan's X/Twitter - Brendan's Bluesky Questions or comments, email us at railsbusinesspod@gmail.com Send a text

    31 min

  5. JAN 22

    Striving for Ideal Code

    In this episode, the hosts discuss reflect on the high-quality, maintainable code found in various videos and books and their own aspirations to emulate such coding standards. The conversation covers the challenges of maintaining good coding practices over time and under business pressures. They explore the concept of 'good enough' code based on the maturity stage of a business, and debate how AI impacts coding quality. The hosts consider how AI can assist in writing tests, potential pitfalls, and the complexity of integrating AI into development while maintaining high standards. Lastly, they touch upon the concept of agentic coding and the importance of well-defined code boundaries in future development strategies. 00:00 Introduction and Catching Up 00:34 Exciting News from 37 Signals 02:11 The Urge for Clean Code 03:33 Challenges in Maintaining Code Quality 06:45 Reflections on Code Quality and Team Dynamics 16:12 The Role of AI in Coding 18:18 AI's Role in Code Architecture 18:33 AI in Controller and View Design 19:42 AI's Limitations in High-Level Decisions 21:13 Using AI for Writing Code and Tests 25:09 The Future of AI in Code Readability 29:49 Challenges and Hypotheses in AI-Driven Development 33:54 Final Thoughts and Future Topics LINKS - Ryan's Website - Brendan's X/Twitter - Brendan's Bluesky Questions or comments, email us at railsbusinesspod@gmail.com Send a text

    34 min

  6. JAN 8

    Mateus Pereira

    In this episode, we chat with Mateus Pereira from Ombu Labs about the nuances of Rails upgrades and how AI is revolutionizing the process. From tackling gem dependencies to client collaboration, Mateus shares valuable insights and tips for executing seamless upgrades. Perfect for developers looking to streamline their Rails projects and leverage AI tools effectively. 00:00 Introduction and Casual Chat 00:25 Meet Mateus: Senior Rails Engineer 01:29 Mateus' Journey into Programming 02:17 Joining Ombu Labs: Trials and Triumphs 03:33 Lessons from Rejection and Persistence 04:35 Challenges in Rails Upgrades 08:12 Tackling Gem Dependencies 20:04 The Role of AI in Rails Upgrades 30:47 Discussing Ruby Critic and Rails Bump 32:07 AI in Code Refactoring 33:58 Client Relationships and Project Management 44:14 Challenges with Test Coverage 45:32 Manual Testing and QA Processes 49:18 Using AI for Writing Tests 55:37 Final Thoughts and Sign-Off LINKS - Mateus' Blog - Mateus' X/Twitter - Mateus' LinkedIn - Ryan's Website - Brendan's X/Twitter - Brendan's Bluesky Questions or comments, email us at railsbusinesspod@gmail.com Send a text

    57 min

  7. 12/04/2025

    Nate Berkopec

    In this episode, Nate Berkopec, the proprietor of Speedshop, a Ruby on Rails performance consultancy, author of several books including the Complete Guide to Rails Performance, and a maintainer of Puma, joins the podcast. Nate discusses his journey into Rails performance optimization, starting from his early career at startups and his breakthrough talk at the Gotham Ruby Conference. He outlines his 'Three S' framework—Speed, Scalability, and Stability—for tackling performance issues. The discussion includes practical advice for Heroku users on optimizing 'dynos' for better request queuing and performance, as well as insights on using tools like JudoScale and PG Analyze for better Sidekiq job management and database optimization. Nate also touches on the importance of setting proper performance thresholds to balance system efficiency and operational costs. 00:00 Introduction to Nate Berkopec and Speedshop 00:45 Nate's Early Career and Interest in Performance 03:36 The Impact of Nate's Conference Talk and Book 04:40 Challenges in Diagnosing Performance Issues 10:22 Framework for Tackling Performance Problems 17:27 Understanding Heroku's Load Balancing 27:39 Understanding TCP Open Failures 28:10 Optimizing Dynos on Heroku 29:16 Setting Performance Thresholds 31:12 The Importance of Monitoring and Automation 34:25 Challenges with Sidekiq and Data Processing 36:24 Best Practices for Sidekiq Queues 44:48 Ensuring Job Idempotency and Efficiency 49:26 Rapid Fire Tips for Indies 52:41 Conclusion and Final Thoughts LINKS - Speedshop - Nate's X/Twitter - The Complete Guide to Rails Performance Book - Sidekiq in Practice Book - High Availabillity Wikipedia Article - Ryan's Website - Brendan's X/Twitter - Brendan's Bluesky Questions or comments, email us at railsbusinesspod@gmail.com Send a text

    53 min

  8. 11/21/2025

    Communicating Project Requirements

    In this episode, we tackle the nuances of communicating project requirements within development teams. From managing user stories and acceptance criteria to balancing control and flexibility, we explore best practices for ensuring clarity and efficiency. We share real-world experiences, including the effectiveness of detailed videos and spikes in guiding team members.  01:24 Communicating with Different Levels of Expertise 06:06 The Role of Videos in Communication 14:45 Challenges in Estimating and Scoping Projects 30:52 Using AI to Assist in Writing Tickets LINKS - Ryan's Website - Brendan's X/Twitter - Brendan's Bluesky Questions or comments, email us at railsbusinesspod@gmail.com Send a text

    32 min
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About

Brendan Buckingham and Ryan Frisch talk about developing with Ruby on Rails and how to leverage it to build a business.

Information

  • Creator
    Brendan Buckingham & Ryan Frisch
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    29
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Rails Business
  • Show Website
    Rails Business

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