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Rails 5 Features You Haven't Heard About by Sean Griffin We've all heard about Action Cable, Turbolinks 5, and Rails::API. But Rails 5 was almost a thousand commits! They included dozens of minor features, many of which will be huge quality of life improvements even if you aren't using WebSockets or Turbolinks. This will be a deep look at several of the "minor" features of Rails 5. You won't just learn about the features, but you'll learn about why they were added, the reasoning behind them, and the difficulties of adding them from someone directly involved in many of them. Help us caption & translate this video! http://amara.org/v/J5Cj/
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In the talk "Rails 5 Features You Haven't Heard About," Sean Griffin presents a detailed exploration of lesser-known features introduced in Rails 5, focusing on quality-of-life improvements that enhance the developer experience. ### Key Points Discussed: - **Emphasis on Quality of Life Features:** - Sean highlights that while major features like Action Cable and Turbolinks often grab attention, small improvements are foundational for enhancing developer workflows. - **Type Attributes API:** - One significant feature is the type attributes API, which was partially implemented in Rails 4 but expanded in Rails 5. It allows developers to define attributes in a manner that aligns more closely with their underlying database structures, particularly benefiting those who need data encryption. - **Left Pad Method:** - A humorous highlight was the inclusion of a left pad method, which had been requested many times by the community, showcasing the importance of incorporating even the most trivial requests for user convenience. - **Active Support's 'or' Method:** - The talk introduces a long-awaited feature allowing 'or' expressions within Active Record queries, making it easier for developers to combine conditions dynamically. Sean elaborates on the careful consideration that went into its implementation, emphasizing the need for clarity and usability in the API. - **Metadata Table for Safety:** - Sean also discusses a new metadata table that prevents the accidental dropping of production databases by tracking migration states and alerting developers to risks when performing destructive actions. - **Enhanced Migrations:** - New features in migrations ensure they are tracked by their Rails version, offering better control over legacy code execution and improving backward compatibility. - **Accessed Fields in Active Record:** - The new accessed_fields feature allows developers to track which fields have been used on Active Record models, helping optimize database interactions in applications. - **Boolean Field Handling:** - Updates to the handling of boolean fields aim to clarify truthy and falsy values, thereby avoiding pitfalls most developers encounter due to misunderstandings in earlier versions. ### Conclusion and Takeaways: - Sean's talk serves as both an informative session on new Rails 5 features and a narrative on the journey of developing them, emphasizing collaboration, safety, and ease of use in Rails. - It strikes a balance between explaining technical features and sharing personal insights from the development process, ultimately reinforcing the community-driven nature of open-source software development. - The overall takeaway is that while significant updates are vital, the many minor refinements are what truly impact developers' day-to-day coding experiences, making Rails a continually evolving tool for web development.
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