Re: [PLUG] Ruby / Rails Backwards Compatibility

[Paul Jungwirth <pj@illuminatedcomputing.com>]

Hi Rich,

On 03/25/2015 06:28 AM, Rich Freeman wrote:
> I've managed to encounter a Ruby/Rails application that is running on
> a fairly old version of both,

Rails 2.3 -> 3.0 took some effort.
Rails 3.0 -> 3.1 -> 3.2 was very easy.
Rails 3.2 -> 4.0 was not too bad.
Rails 4.0 -> 4.1 -> 4.2 was also very easy.

Ruby 1.8 -> 1.9 involved Unicode encoding changes so was sometimes hard.
Ruby 1.9 -> 2.x hasn't been a big deal for any of my projects.

Honestly I think none of these upgrades are a huge amount of effort. I 
think most of the problems people had with Rails 2 -> 3 were learning 
curve problems (e.g. figuring out the asset pipeline) rather than 
actually adapting their code.

The other problem is dependencies, but at this point all your 
dependencies should support the latest Rails/Ruby versions (assuming 
they are still maintained).

The effort required will mostly depend on how big your app is and the 
quality of the existing code. Also if you have automated tests your QA 
burden will be a lot easier.

In the Ruby/Rails world things change pretty fast, which of course is 
good and bad. If you have no in-house Ruby expertise then there is risk 
having an app in that technology, because it's hard to change and you 
are less likely to apply security updates. But those problems are less 
about how fast the tech changes and more about how the tech fits with 
your org. At least with the security patches, any tech will require 
occasional attention.

I do freelance Ruby/Rails development for a living, so if your company 
wants to hire me for a few hours to look at the code and write up an 
assessment/upgrade plan, I'd be happy to do that. I moved to Portland, 
OR a few years ago, so you'd have to be okay with a remote arrangement. 
If you want someone local, I'm sure you could find people on the 
philly.rb mailing list.

Good luck!
Paul


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