We Will Install These Tools in Every App From Now On...
We are just building a new MVP for a partnership product.
After years of running my agency building apps, I know how important it is to debug data - early on. Especially we want to have insights into three things. These packages exist in any ecosystem, and here we show it for Ruby on Rails.
My name is Till Carlos and I document how my team builds products. And today we are talking three essential tools for MVP that cost nothing.
Database Explorer: RailsAdmin
When developing an MVP, you often need to inspect and manipulate data directly without building specific interfaces for every model. This is where RailsAdmin comes in handy. RailsAdmin is a Rails engine that provides a comprehensive admin interface for your database. It automatically scans your schema and generates a user-friendly interface for CRUD (Create, Read, Update, Delete) operations on all your models.
Key benefits:
Quick setup: Just add the gem and it works out of the box Automatic interface generation: No need to write custom views for each model Authorization integration: Works with popular authorization gems like Pundit or CanCanCan
Remember to secure this powerful tool behind an admin-only route to prevent unauthorized access.
Job Queue Monitor: Mission Control
Background jobs are often crucial for keeping your application responsive. However, without proper visibility into these jobs, debugging can become a nightmare. This is where a job queue monitor like Mission Control (for SolidQueue) or Sidekiq Web (for Sidekiq) becomes invaluable.
These tools provide a web interface where you can:
- View all queued, running, and completed jobs
- Inspect job parameters and execution details
- Manage recurring tasks
- Monitor queue performance
Having this level of insight into your background processes can save hours of debugging time and help you optimize your application’s performance.
Report Generator: Blazer
As your MVP grows, you’ll often need to generate reports or dashboards to understand your data better. Writing custom queries and views for each report can be time-consuming. This is where Blazer shines. Blazer is a powerful query tool and report generator for Rails. Years ago my friend Rado, who writes a great newsletter, recommended this to me.
It allows you to:
- Write and save SQL queries
- Create dashboards with multiple queries
- Share reports with team members
The beauty of Blazer is that it enables you to quickly create data visualizations and reports without writing any Rails views. This is particularly useful in the early stages of your MVP when you’re still figuring out what metrics are important.
Remember, the goal of an MVP is to learn about your users and validate your ideas as quickly as possible. By having these powerful tools at your disposal from the start, you’re setting yourself up for faster iteration and more informed decision-making.
If you are curious why I put such an emphasis on starting with infractructure: have a look at my last video where I talk about my reasoning about admin first.
