Episode 57 - Marco Roth

Code and the Coding Coders who Code it

Marco Roth joins us to unveil Herb, his revolutionary toolchain for Rails views that's reshaping how we work with HTML and ERB. Having identified a critical gap in the Rails ecosystem—robust tooling for the view layer—Marco decided to build the solution himself, learning C along the way to create a parser with unparalleled cross-platform compatibility.
Far from just another syntax checker, Herb represents a comprehensive vision for modernizing Rails views. Marco walks us through his layered approach, starting with immediate editor feedback for markup errors and ambitious plans for reactive views inspired by Phoenix LiveView. The most exciting prospect? Allowing developers to write modern, interactive applications without abandoning Ruby for JavaScript frameworks. "I want to bring back some awesome experiences from JavaScript to the Rails ecosystem so we can keep doing Ruby," Marco explains, highlighting how Herb could transform ActionView after two decades of relative stagnation.
We also explore Marco's approach to managing multiple ambitious projects alongside a consulting career, his upcoming conference schedule (including RailsWorld, FrienlyRB, and Euruko), and his work on Ruby Events—a catalog of over 7,000 Ruby talks that serves as an invaluable community resource. Marco shares insights into his development process, the challenges of mapping tag helpers to HTML, and his recent implementation of Tailwind class sorting in the Herb formatter.
Whether you're frustrated with Rails' front-end limitations or simply curious about innovative tools reshaping the Ruby ecosystem, this conversation offers a fascinating glimpse into the future of web development with Rails. Marco's work reminds us that with the right tooling, we can build modern, reactive applications while maintaining the developer happiness that drew us to Ruby in the first place.

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Chapters

1. Introduction and Marco Roth Overview (00:00:00)

2. Introducing Project Herb (00:01:27)

3. Learning C for Parser Development (00:06:05)

4. Upcoming Conference Speaking Schedule (00:13:08)

5. Tackling Tag Helpers in Parsing (00:19:54)

6. Ruby Events Website (00:32:34)

7. Herb Formatter and Future Development (00:45:20)

8. Closing and Show Wrap-up (00:59:43)