Sally and Aji flick through thoughtbot’s guide to best practices in a bid to brush up on their coding habits.

Our hosts discuss key ideas from the guides that stand out to them the most, why they’re considered to be good practice, as well as reviewing the cons of complex writing and the benefits of simple coding.

—

Be sure to check out Sally’s new repo Michel if you’re looking to create an appointment database, and check out the thoughtbot guides for more general coding advice.

If you’ve got some spare time and want to hear Aji’s talk on breaking the enigma code you can watch that here.

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Sally Hall and Aji Slater.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: [email protected]

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2026 thoughtbot, inc.

Support The Bike Shed

Joël and Sally examine the simpler components of programming and why using basic data structures may not always be the best approach to solving a problem.

Our hosts cover all the telltale signs and symptoms of primitive obsession, what it is, it’s drawbacks and limitations, and how to avoid it creeping into your own work.

—

Want to learn more about primitive obsession and readability in programming? Check out these links for some wider reading, including a talk from Joël! - Design Patterns and Null - thoughtbot blog on primitive obsession - Define User

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Sally Hall.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: [email protected]

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2026 thoughtbot, inc.

Support The Bike Shed

Joël talks with guest thoughtbotter Steve Polito about his recent work rewriting Suspenders, an old thoughtbot gem from the 2000s.

Steve discusses his role on the rewrite and the steps he took in optimising it for modern rails, Joël dives into some of the new features found in the gem, before discussing with Steve the use cases for Suspenders and why you might choose it over other rails starter apps.

—

Want to learn more about our gem Suspenders? Check out some of these links to get yourself up to speed and try it for yourself.

Suspenders Gem - Suspenders Feature List - thoughtbot’s guide for programming

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Steve Polito.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: [email protected]

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2026 thoughtbot, inc.

Support The Bike Shed

Sally and Aji assess some common metrics for success when working a project and how they may not always provide the clearest picture of how things are going.

Together they discuss how to communicate effectively with stakeholders who are less technical to fully appreciate certain decisions and choices being made on a project, as well as the different metrics you can use to better reflect success and setbacks on a project.

—

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Sally Hall and Aji Slater.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: [email protected]

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2026 thoughtbot, inc.

Support The Bike Shed

Joël and Aji reference their personal bibliographies as they compare the different influences that have shaped their programmer world view.

Our hosts discuss their most influential programming material, from books, talks and video, and how it’s impacted the way they write code, Joël hones in on the importance of confidence and dealing with uncertainty of objects in a project, while Aji dips into his knowledge of RailConf talks to find his biggest inspiration.

—

Take a leaf out of our hosts book and discover some of the material that influenced them and their work for yourself - POODR - Confident Ruby - RailsConf 2014 Talk - Take Smart Notes - Working Effectively with Legacy Code

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Aji Slater.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: [email protected]

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2026 thoughtbot, inc.

Support The Bike Shed

Our hosts discuss the pros of AI and where they find the tool genuinely useful, it’s limitations, downsides and where it’s causing harm, the differences between bad AI code and human code, before asking the question of where this AI boom could be leading us.

—

To get more of an insight into today’s episode consider watching Sandi Metz's RubyConf talk to learn more about red-lighting, or read the article Aji mentioned about running out of ideas.

Thanks to our sponsor for this episode Scout Monitoring.

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Sally Hall and Aji Slater.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: [email protected]

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2026 thoughtbot, inc.

Support The Bike Shed

Joël and Sally tidy up the place as they discuss the different ways a new codebase and team can feel welcoming to them.

Together they break down the things that help them ingrate into a new project more easily, explain why the lore of a project can be sacred to some, what you can do in the present to make things easier for a developer down the road, and why communication is crucial for keeping everyone on the same page even long after you’ve moved on.

—

Check out these resources for a deeper dive into some of the topics mentioned in this week’s episode - Fixtures - Hierarchy of Documentation - Domain Modelling 1 - Domain Modelling 2

Thanks to our sponsor for this episode Scout Monitoring.

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Sally Hall.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: [email protected]

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2026 thoughtbot, inc.

Support The Bike Shed

Aji and Joël talk all things hackerthons and why taking the time to have a little having fun with your work every now and then is important for developers.

Our hosts reflect on their shared experience at a previous RailsConf where they entered a mini hackerthon, why playing around in a creative sandbox is crucial to honing your skills as a dev, and how programming on the fly can teach you a lot about your own strengths and weaknesses.

—

Read more about Joël’s entry in Rails Rumble, as well as their participation in the RailsConf 2022 mini Hackerthon.

Thanks to our sponsors for this episode Judoscale - Autoscale the Right Way (check the link for your free gift!), and Scout Monitoring.

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Aji Slater.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: [email protected]

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2025 thoughtbot, inc.

Support The Bike Shed

Joël contributes some thoughts on working with custom attributes as he follows up on last week’s discussion about ActiveModels with Sally.

Joël breaks down how he transforms various strings and objects when working with ActiveModels to simplify more advance workloads, as Sally queries their different use cases and how best to utilise them for her own workflow.

—

Catch up on Sally and Aji’s episode from last week on ActiveModels before diving into this discussion!

If you’d like to give some of the gems mentioned in this episode a try for yourself they can be found here - phonelib - money-rails - astronoby

Thanks to our sponsors for this episode Judoscale - Autoscale the Right Way (check the link for your free gift!), and Scout Monitoring.

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Sally Hall.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: [email protected]

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2025 thoughtbot, inc.

Support The Bike Shed

Aji and Sally join forces to discuss the different ways they utilise active models in their workflows.

Aji describes a new system for working with active models they’ve been using recently, Sally recalls a project where active models could have saved her a lot of time, before putting their heads together to think of new creative ways to utilise rails’ tools toolset to build other active models.

—

Discover more of The Magic of Rails through Eileen Uchitelle’s Keynote, or check out the GitHub repo mentioned in this episode.

Thanks to our sponsors for this episode Judoscale - Autoscale the Right Way (check the link for your free gift!), and Scout Monitoring.

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Sally Hall and Aji Slater.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: [email protected]

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2025 thoughtbot, inc.

Support The Bike Shed

Joël and Aji kick off a new season by discussing the best use cases for HTTP basic auth and talking all things security.

The pair ask when and why you would use basic auth over standard HTTPS, it’s pros, cons and vulnerabilities over other forms of security, and provide some advice to help decide on what form of security you could implement on your site.

—

Thanks to our sponsors for this episode Judoscale - Autoscale the Right Way (check the link for your free gift!), and Scout Monitoring.

Check out these links for more information on some of the topics covered in today’s episode - Cross-Origin Resource Sharing - Cross-site request forgery (CSRF) - The Universe is Hostile to Computers

Your hosts for this episode have been thoughtbot’s own Joël Quenneville and Aji Slater.

If you would like to support the show, head over to our GitHub page, or check out our website.

Got a question or comment about the show? Why not write to our hosts: [email protected]

This has been a thoughtbot podcast.
Stay up to date by following us on social media - YouTube - LinkedIn - Mastodon - BlueSky

© 2025 thoughtbot, inc.

Support The Bike Shed