"Presentations" Posts
Posted in Scout, Presentations, Atlanta | 3 comments 
CBQ
Last night, I demoed Scout to a room-full of Rubyists at the Atlanta Ruby User Group Meeting.
I would love to share all the wonderful feedback, but instead, I’ll share some of the excellent questions (and more elaborate answers) that were asked of Scout:
What are the security pitfalls, i.e. can someone simply write a ‘rm -rf’ plugin?
To answer that, let’s look at the architecture of Scout first:
- You install the tiny Scout client (which is a Ruby gem) on your server.
- The client connects over https (always) through a 256-bit secure, encrypted connection (the same encryption your bank uses).
- Scout never logs in to any of your servers.
- All communication is initiated by the client.
- The client downloads a pre-loaded plugin plan, consisting only of plugins of your choosing, so it cannot run plugins you didn’t explicitly authorize.
- The server also uses that same secure encryption for all communication. Individual accounts are protected.
- Client keys (uniquely generated) can be revoked at any time, disabling the client.
The security measures needed for Scout are the same as for any other software. In fact, in some ways, it’s easier to be more secure – the plugins are relatively few lines of code and easy to review. For a more closed environent, you can create a copy of the plugin code and host it on one of your own servers (a plugin is plain text).
Is Scout open source?
The Scout client is completely open source. The gem is a normal Ruby gem, open for development, and distributed under the MIT and/or Ruby License (whichever you prefer). The Scout Plugins people write are also completely open, in fact, they are surrounded and fostered by a community that encourages branching, fixes, and general open-ness.
The Server, where you aggregate your data, do reporting, and in general, collect information about your account is not open-source. We maintain the server, and keep all your data safe and sound.
When does it launch?
We’re doing the plumbing now – account subscriptions, a new home page, privacy policies, backup procedures, etc. We’ve recognized that lots of people are anxious to get going and we’re working to get it ready for public use as fast as possible.
Posted in Community, Presentations
James
I’ll be representing Highgroove at the Lone Star Rubyconf this weekend. I’ll give two talks, one for the charity event the night before and another at the main conference.
At the charity event I’m going to go over Ruby’s block syntax. I’ll cover what blocks are, how they are used, and give a lot of great examples. This is a good talk to sit in on if you’re new to Ruby and it’s even for a good cause.
For the conference I’m going to talk about heroes and super powers. I’m sure I’ll manage to sneak a little Ruby in there too, for those that enjoy that. This talk takes an in depth look at glue code and Ruby’s features supporting such. It’ll be fun stuff that doesn’t get talked about enough.
If you are attending the conference, do flag me down and say hello. I’m always interested in meeting fellow Rubyists.
Hope to see you there!
Posted in Oklahoma, Presentations, Ruby on Rails | no comments
James
If you are just getting into Rails or still don’t get what all the fuss is about and you happen to be near Oklahoma, you may walk to catch my talk tomorrow night for Refresh OKC. The meeting starts at 6:30 PM in the Oklahoma City Public Library.
I’ve got a massive talk prepared covering as large a portion of Rails as I can possibly fit in given the time. I do include some cool topics like using the Rails console and even AJAX. I even sneak in a little magic.
Do drop by if you are in the neighborhood…
Posted in Presentations, Atlanta, Ruby on Rails, Slingshot | no comments
CBQ
A Presentation on with Screech Powers, Cesar Milan (The Dog Whisper), Sean Penn, and guest Ruby celebrity (and Atlanta native) Obie Fernandez. Despite the antics, Capistrano is a powerful, yet simple, bona-fide, big-boy tool. It sure does make our life easier. We like it so much, we’ve made it our goal with Slingshot Hosting to get your Ruby on Rails application up and running with our customized Capistrano Recipes, so you can focus on development.
Capistrano – Atlanta Ruby Users Group PDF
Posted in Presentations, San Francisco, Ruby on Rails | no comments
Derek
Another San Francisco Ruby Meetup. Another record-breaking attendance mark (has any Ruby group in the world brought together more than 110 people?).
Here’s the slides from my presentation on how Highgroove Studios molds its team and development process to utilize Ruby on Rails:
Download Utilizing Ruby on Rails PDF
Posted in Oklahoma, Presentations, Ruby on Rails | no comments
James
I'll be giving a Rails presentation to OK.rb this coming Tuesday (June 13th). Anyone in the OKC area is more than welcome to attend.
My talk will be a tour of some live production code HighGroove has generated for clients. I'll cover sections of interest from three different applications. This should be a good chance for us to explore how Rails applications come together.
For more in formation visit OK.rb's meeting schedule or email me with your questions.
