3 ms·

Ask HN: Review my first Rails app? Pitchforked

24 points by pstinnett 17y ago

pstinnett 17y ago
I just "launched" my first Ruby on Rails application last night. It creates a random playlist of songs from Pitchfork.com's best new albums area. Up to now I've primarily worked with PHP. A little backstory: Just a little over a month ago I saw Zach Klein (now working at Boxee) tweet this: http://twitter.com/zachklein/status/7770633908 http://twitter.com/zachklein/status/7770633908 I had been reading through the new railstutorial.org, but I always learn more quickly working on a real project. So I took a stab at the app and here I am. I'd love to hear any feedback or comments/questions. Thanks!
- evlapix 17y ago
  Very nice design. Looks like pitchfork improved their security a bit. I remember they used to just have an XMPP player, where the XML behind it just had an additional node titled security. It's contents said something to the effect of.. "Don't download these files!". Or something like that.
  - pstinnett 17y ago
    Thanks. I'm not really sure about Pitchfork's security...I know they lock down their mp3s and had some recent trouble (maybe?) with leaking albums? Not 100% sure on that last part. All the mp3 files that I'm using are provided by 8tracks.com via their API.
    - yogione 17y ago
      I like the clean design. Do you have a blog with notes of the whole process - plugins used / css / js / hosting.
      - pstinnett 17y ago
        No blog yet. After I get the first round of revisions done on pitchforked I'll get something up that details the process. I've been taking notes throughout the whole thing, just haven't gotten around to it yet! I'll post again once that's ready.
- nonrecursive 17y ago
  This is off-topic, but does your mother teach math? Edit: yes, I believe that is indeed you, patso. I'm Daniel Higginbotham. Neat app. I like the user interface. The "loading" bar is neat. The icons (notes, price tag/star, calendar) look clickable to me but it seems like they're not.
  - pstinnett 17y ago
    Dan! Strange meeting on HN! Hope all is going well with you. The icons aren't clickable but the text underneath click through to the review page. I'll see about making that entire area clickable to keep people from being confused.
    - nonrecursive 17y ago
      Yeah this is strange. I keep thinking of how your mother would get mad at me for reading in her class. Anyway, feel free to contact me any time about rails or ruby stuff. I've been doing rails work for more than four years now and would be happy to help out. My email's in my profile and my AIM is willmakeawhisper
      - pstinnett 17y ago
        Haha. I'm sure she doesn't remember that now! I'll shoot you an email shortly.
kungfooey 17y ago
I think it's pretty neat. Very simple interface that tells you pretty much exactly what it's going to do.
- kungfooey 17y ago
  A pause/play button would be nice.
  - pstinnett 17y ago
    You can pause by clicking anywhere on the track name (except the links to the review). I guess that might not be obvious though...
    - kungfooey 17y ago
      Yeah, I figured that out after playing with it for a while. Another nice feature would be a skip button.
    - pstinnett 17y ago
      Unfortunately, due to licensing restrictions, I can't add a skip button in:( Same sort of problem with Pandora. You can only skip a certain amount of tracks in a certain time period, so I've just excluded the option to skip tracks.
      - kungfooey 17y ago
        Easy to get around by just reloading. :)
pclark 17y ago
great domain. doesn't work so well with chrome and flashblock, can't find the flash element to unblock.
- pstinnett 17y ago
  Thanks. I've gotten some reports about problems with Flashblock/Clicktoflash. I'll hopefully have an update to fix that tonight. Thanks for checking out the site!
dogas 17y ago
I like it a lot, reminds me of muxtape before they got taken down. One suggestion - the onmouseover gray hover color gets a bit annoying for the current song playing. Also, a fast forward link would be great, in case the song is a little "out there".
- dogas 17y ago
  Also don't forget to package up those assets. I recommend jammit (http://documentcloud.github.com/jammit/ http://documentcloud.github.com/jammit/), as it can use the google javascript compiler to squeeze out a couple extra kb.
  - pstinnett 17y ago
    I'll take a look at that! Nothing is packaged yet. Is there an easy way to get this into the deployment process so that my dev site isn't packaged and everything on the production side is? Thanks!
    - jashkenas 17y ago
      Yep, that's the whole idea. In development everything is unpacked, uncompressed and debuggable. In production, you get packaged CSS, JS, and (optionally) images, for the smallest size and fewest HTTP requests possible. If you have any questions, feel free to email me (jeremy at documentcloud dot org), or start an Issue on GitHub.
      - pstinnett 17y ago
        Excellent! I've got this added in to my issues for pitchforked. Will be implementing it in the next couple of revisions.
- AndrewHampton 17y ago
  Great site! I typically use Last.fm for background music while working, but I think I like this at least just as much. I agree w/ dogas that a next button would be nice though.
wsbail29 17y ago
Nice job! I did something like this awhile ago too. I wrote a scraper that pulled all of the reviews from Pitchfork (scraping was necessary before they updated their site with rss feeds). My app currently just display a random set of reviews on each visit. http://pitchforkd.thirtymontgomery.com http://pitchforkd.thirtymontgomery.com I was actually thinking about updating it to add playlist functionality. Thanks for pointing out 8tracks.com. I'll have to check it out.

24 points by pstinnett 17y ago

I just "launched" my first Ruby on Rails application last night. It creates a random playlist of songs from Pitchfork.com's best new albums area. Up to now I've primarily worked with PHP. A little backstory: Just a little over a month ago I saw Zach Klein (now working at Boxee) tweet this: http://twitter.com/zachklein/status/7770633908 http://twitter.com/zachklein/status/7770633908 I had been reading through the new railstutorial.org, but I always learn more quickly working on a real project. So I took a stab at the app and here I am. I'd love to hear any feedback or comments/questions. Thanks!

evlapix 17y ago
Very nice design. Looks like pitchfork improved their security a bit. I remember they used to just have an XMPP player, where the XML behind it just had an additional node titled security. It's contents said something to the effect of.. "Don't download these files!". Or something like that.
- pstinnett 17y ago
  Thanks. I'm not really sure about Pitchfork's security...I know they lock down their mp3s and had some recent trouble (maybe?) with leaking albums? Not 100% sure on that last part. All the mp3 files that I'm using are provided by 8tracks.com via their API.
  - yogione 17y ago
    I like the clean design. Do you have a blog with notes of the whole process - plugins used / css / js / hosting.
    - pstinnett 17y ago
      No blog yet. After I get the first round of revisions done on pitchforked I'll get something up that details the process. I've been taking notes throughout the whole thing, just haven't gotten around to it yet! I'll post again once that's ready.
nonrecursive 17y ago
This is off-topic, but does your mother teach math? Edit: yes, I believe that is indeed you, patso. I'm Daniel Higginbotham. Neat app. I like the user interface. The "loading" bar is neat. The icons (notes, price tag/star, calendar) look clickable to me but it seems like they're not.
- pstinnett 17y ago
  Dan! Strange meeting on HN! Hope all is going well with you. The icons aren't clickable but the text underneath click through to the review page. I'll see about making that entire area clickable to keep people from being confused.
  - nonrecursive 17y ago
    Yeah this is strange. I keep thinking of how your mother would get mad at me for reading in her class. Anyway, feel free to contact me any time about rails or ruby stuff. I've been doing rails work for more than four years now and would be happy to help out. My email's in my profile and my AIM is willmakeawhisper
    - pstinnett 17y ago
      Haha. I'm sure she doesn't remember that now! I'll shoot you an email shortly.

kungfooey 17y ago

I think it's pretty neat. Very simple interface that tells you pretty much exactly what it's going to do.

kungfooey 17y ago
A pause/play button would be nice.
- pstinnett 17y ago
  You can pause by clicking anywhere on the track name (except the links to the review). I guess that might not be obvious though...
  - kungfooey 17y ago
    Yeah, I figured that out after playing with it for a while. Another nice feature would be a skip button.
  - pstinnett 17y ago
    Unfortunately, due to licensing restrictions, I can't add a skip button in:( Same sort of problem with Pandora. You can only skip a certain amount of tracks in a certain time period, so I've just excluded the option to skip tracks.
    - kungfooey 17y ago
      Easy to get around by just reloading. :)

pclark 17y ago

great domain. doesn't work so well with chrome and flashblock, can't find the flash element to unblock.

pstinnett 17y ago
Thanks. I've gotten some reports about problems with Flashblock/Clicktoflash. I'll hopefully have an update to fix that tonight. Thanks for checking out the site!

dogas 17y ago

I like it a lot, reminds me of muxtape before they got taken down. One suggestion - the onmouseover gray hover color gets a bit annoying for the current song playing. Also, a fast forward link would be great, in case the song is a little "out there".

dogas 17y ago
Also don't forget to package up those assets. I recommend jammit (http://documentcloud.github.com/jammit/ http://documentcloud.github.com/jammit/), as it can use the google javascript compiler to squeeze out a couple extra kb.
- pstinnett 17y ago
  I'll take a look at that! Nothing is packaged yet. Is there an easy way to get this into the deployment process so that my dev site isn't packaged and everything on the production side is? Thanks!
  - jashkenas 17y ago
    Yep, that's the whole idea. In development everything is unpacked, uncompressed and debuggable. In production, you get packaged CSS, JS, and (optionally) images, for the smallest size and fewest HTTP requests possible. If you have any questions, feel free to email me (jeremy at documentcloud dot org), or start an Issue on GitHub.
    - pstinnett 17y ago
      Excellent! I've got this added in to my issues for pitchforked. Will be implementing it in the next couple of revisions.
AndrewHampton 17y ago
Great site! I typically use Last.fm for background music while working, but I think I like this at least just as much. I agree w/ dogas that a next button would be nice though.

wsbail29 17y ago

Nice job! I did something like this awhile ago too. I wrote a scraper that pulled all of the reviews from Pitchfork (scraping was necessary before they updated their site with rss feeds). My app currently just display a random set of reviews on each visit. http://pitchforkd.thirtymontgomery.com http://pitchforkd.thirtymontgomery.com I was actually thinking about updating it to add playlist functionality. Thanks for pointing out 8tracks.com. I'll have to check it out.