Goruco Videos

Justin Gordon

Front-End Sadness to Happiness: The React on Rails Story

Synopsis

Standard Rails development made me happy like no other programming paradigm in my career. Simple front-end development with standard Rails and a sprinkling of jQuery was ‘OK’ Then, in 2014, I had to build a front-end that dynamically updated like a desktop app. I knew there had to be something better, and I went down the rabbit hole of integrating React with Rails using Webpack. Come find out how my obsessive pursuit of “developer happiness” for the Rails front-end eventually drove me to start the React on Rails gem, the most popular integration of Rails with React using Webpack.

Biography

Aloha! Inspired by the Ruby on Rails Community, Justin began blogging on http://www.railsonmaui.com. A burning desire to bring happiness to Rails front-end development led to the open source project React on Rails. Besides open source, he’s the founder and CEO of http://www.shakacode.com and https://www.friendsandguests.com. Justin has a bachelor’s degree from Harvard and an MBA from UC Berkeley. Free Time: Surfing and other sports in Hawaii!