Honeybadger Developer Blog

How Elixir Lays Out Your Data in Memory

Elixir makes it easy to work with sophisticated data structures. We've come a long way C, where you had to manage every detail of your data's representation in memory. Even so, the way Elixir lays out your data in memory can have real implications on your app's performance. In this article, Sasha Fonseca gives us a tour through Elixir's internal data structures and shows us how they can affect application performance.

By Sasha Fonseca
#ruby
Mar 1, 2021

Code Loaders in Ruby: Understanding Zeitwerk

What makes Rails magical? It just might be its code loader. Put a few files in the right places, and - presto! - you have a web app. When you use a class, Rails handles the include so you can stay focused on your code. But this magic isn't just for Rails! You can add thread-safe code loading to your own apps via the Zeitwerk gem. In this article, Olasubomi introduces us to Zeitwerk and shows us how to integrate it with our own projects.

By Subomi Oluwalana
#ruby
Feb 22, 2021

ActiveRecord For Databases Without Unique Ids

We don't get to choose our families. Some of us don't even get to choose our databases. What do you do if you have the bad luck to inherit a database with non-unique ids? In this case study, Regan Ryan shows us how his team faced the challenge.

By Regan Ryan
#ruby
Feb 15, 2021

Subdomain Takeover: Ignore This Vulnerability at Your Peril

Management thinks that letting folks from WidgetCo log into widgetco.ourapp.com will really help make the sale. It seems harmless enough. But using a custom subdomain like this can open WidgetCo up to potential security issues. In this article, Julien Cretel introduces us to Subdomain Takeover attacks and discusses ways we can mitigate them.

By Julien Cretel
#security
Feb 8, 2021

honeybadger.js is now universal

Some devs use JavaScript in the browser; some use JavaScript on the server. What if you do both?

By Josh Wood
#javascript
Jan 21, 2021

How ActiveRecord Uses Caching To Avoid Unnecessary Trips To The Database

ActiveRecord makes accessing your database easy, but it can also help make it faster by its intelligent use of caching. In this article, Jonathan Miles shows us the tricks that Rails uses to ensure that your database isn't doing more work than it needs to.

By Jonathan Miles
#ruby
Jan 20, 2021

Building, Testing and Deploying AWS Lambda Functions in Ruby

For quick, scalable, highly-available web services, few options compare to AWS Lambda. Just provide your code, add a little configuration, and you're done! In this article, Milap Neupane will introduce us to Lambda, show us how to get it working with Ruby and the Serverless Framework, and discuss reasons to use — or to not use! — Lambda in production.

By Milap Neupane
#ruby
Jan 13, 2021

An Introduction to Go Tooling

When picking a language for your next project, few things are more critical than the tooling it provides. In this article, Ayooluwa Isaiah wraps up our Go for Rubyists series with an introduction to go tooling.

By Ayooluwa Isaiah
#go
Dec 22, 2020

Load Test Your Rails Apps with Apache JMeter

Every Rails app has a breaking point; a level of activity that it simply cannot handle. Your braking point depends on big architectural decisions, yes — and also on the tiniest changes committed by your most junior developer. That's why it's vital to regularly test your application's performance under load. In this article, Milap Neupane gives us a Rails-centric introduction to load testing with a powerful open-source tool called JMeter.

By Milap Neupane
#ruby
Dec 16, 2020

Web Development in Go: Middleware, Templating, Databases & Beyond

Many of the concepts you're already familiar with as a web developer are applicable in Go. In this article, Ayooluwa Isaiah shows us how middleware, templating, and other aspects of the go language work together to create a coherent web-development experience.

By Ayooluwa Isaiah
#ruby
Dec 8, 2020

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