More Transparency On What Gets Included in Rails

A May Of WTFs
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It would be great to get more transparency over the decision process that happens when new frameworks are included into Rails. The current process afaik is that usually pain points the Basecamp solved are extracted into the framework (like ActionText). This has some problems imo:

  1. It’s unclear whether Basecamp is a good representation of most Rails apps, so it could be that unnecessary functionality is being included into Rails. I think ActionText is a pretty good example of something that most web apps don’t have. We got a lot of feedback from users wanting a better rails generator so to remove actioncable/webpack/etc etc. So it’s good to stop and think if there’s a problem in the decision process.

  2. The current process allows no feedback from the community. Perhaps the community has more urgent pain points than what Basecamp is currently solving. I’m not expecting a voting democracy but it’s clear something in the spirit can be done, just a few days ago Matz consulted the community on this forum over keyword arguments.

  3. We’re not sure what the criteria is to include a new functionality in Rails. I would imagine the criteria is a solution to a problem most web apps have + a solution that is good enough so that can satisfy most Rails developers but I’m not sure it’s true. Would be good to clarify this point.

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Rails is omakase - decisionmaking has never been one of community consensus. Ruby is a different story as Matz is nice :slightly_smiling_face:

Perhaps a related question would be, if I believe something should be in Rails, what do I need to do to get it onto the menu?

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if I believe something should be in Rails, what do I need to do to get it onto the menu?

Yes, that too. If we’re gonna keep using the Japanese restaurant analogy I guess I should talk to the chef? Right a review on Yelp?

I’m sure even highly regarded chefs check in on their customers now and then - and if they see 80% aren’t touching the Sashimi, they would probably make adjustments.

I’m basically just asking to get more in touch with the community, I do not think an OSS project should be a democracy. In fact, most projects I can think of have a “dictator for life” of sort (Linus, Guido…) But the “May of WTFS” is an excellent reach out to the community. So simply - more of that please. Try to get in touch more - and then make all your decisions alone. Keep up the awesome work! @DHH

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