GAT TechTalk #4 (DDD in Ruby) - 20th May 2021

The Global App Testing (GAT) Engineering team hosted the highly anticipated fourth addition to the TechTalk series at the end of this past May. With the pandemic in mind, it was conducted exclusively online, enabling increased engagement amongst our global community. We want to first of all extend a special thank you to the Krakow Ruby User Group for their warm welcome.

The event was highly successful (if we may say so ourselves), with 73 attendees representing 26 cities and 11 countries! Keynote speakers included: GAT Co-Founder Ronald Cummings-John, Software Engineering Manager Krzysztof Witczak and Senior Engineers Jan Jędrychowski and Piotr “Pedro” Brych.

Rails monolith modularisation with CQRS - our story

Senior Engineer Jan Jędrychowski kicked off the event with his description of the methodology behind breaking down Rails applications into smaller, more manageable modules. Supported by the CQRS (Command and Query Responsibility Segregation) pattern, he continued to highlight specifically how GAT engineering applies to it.

We are convinced that such an approach gives an ability to slowly and safely extract isolated modules from the application without a headache.

Leading Quality: Lessons learnt from working with the top tech companies in the world

Ronald Cummings-John, Co-Founder of Global App Testing and Co-Author of Leading Quality, followed, sharing anecdotes he learned over the 2.5 years spent writing the book. During that time, he interviewed over 120 of the leading engineering, product and QA leaders from top tech companies including Facebook, Google and Microsoft.

He shared the importance of creating a culture of quality, in which engineering and quality teams drive more influence across the wider company, ultimately supporting business growth. Ron also touched on an exciting topic: the difference between an internal and external view of quality.

GAT Engineering culture

Key values of engineering culture at GAT include "master your craft," "focus on impact" and "iterate fast." Krzysztof Witczak dove into these values, sharing how engineers at GAT contribute to product development, as they actively generate ideas for product backlog within squads. They also have added insight into what is happening within the organisation, therefore impacting company goals. All of this is supported by the newest technologies and high DevOps maturity environment.

Embracing GraphQL

Senior Software Engineer Piotr “Pedro” Brych offered some words of wisdom in the final session of the event; he covered his experience of implementing GraphQL. The project began several years ago, coinciding with the evolution and maturation of this technology.

GAT iterated on the topic on both the backend and frontend, a clear reflection of the GAT value "iterate fast." In the end, Pedro discussed the pros and cons of GraphQL based on feedback, which proved interesting, considering the lack of unanimity between the present engineers.

A Q&A segment with the attendees rounded off each session, offering a great platform to openly discuss expectations of currents methods and standards used across the company.

To round off the event, everyone was invited (and encouraged) to participate in a quiz in which the three best scores were showered with GAT swag.

The proof of the pudding in the event's success comes from the broad scope of attendees and engagement across social media channels. This is why we look forward to each event in the TechTalk series and confidently look forward to future events.

Many thanks to all who attended on the day! For those unable to attend, we look forward to seeing you at future GAT initiatives.

And remember to keep your eyes peeled, as GAT TechTalk #5 is in the works. In the meantime, if you're interested in our current open positions, you can find them here.

Last but not least, the full recording of this TechTalk can be found here. Happy viewing!