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DHH’s new way of writing code

Overview

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DHH’s new way of writing code

The Pragmatic Engineer

6 DAYS AGO
The Pragmatic Engineer

The Pragmatic Engineer

6 DAYS AGO
OverviewShownoteHighlightsTranscriptChaptersPins

Shownote

Brought to You By: • Statsig — ⁠ The unified platform for flags, analytics, experiments, and more. • Sonar – The makers of SonarQube, the industry standard for automated code review • WorkOS – Everything you need to make your app enterprise ready. — D...

Highlights

David Heinemeier Hansson reflects on his dramatic shift from typing every line of code to embracing an agent-first development philosophy—six months after publicly rejecting AI coding tools.
00:00
DHH built a Linux distribution called Omarchy using AI assistance
02:17
Ruby on Rails was born out of building Basecamp with Ruby in 2003 when there was little web-app tooling for Ruby
08:25
Basecamp was their best business idea and has thrived for over 20 years
12:56
HEY's screener allows users to control who can reach their inbox
21:35
At 37signals, designers are product managers and builders
25:55
Aesthetics is truth—well-designed objects contribute to happiness while poorly designed ones cause anxiety
28:22
Beautiful things can improve human happiness
34:52
GPT-4.5 produces high-quality output that often requires little to no alteration
39:48
Decision-makers returned in January and mandated AI use across teams
49:09
AI agents autonomously signed up for HEY, Fizzy, and Basecamp without human assistance
1:00:36
Work and job satisfaction are changing for software engineers at 37signals, and their view on running AI agents has shifted from reluctance to enjoyment
1:10:47
Even if AI model improvement hits a wall, people could spend decades learning to use existing tools better
1:16:43
The average programmer may face price pressures, especially in cost-center software development
1:34:08
Working with AI has made programming more enjoyable, similar to the feeling of discovering Ruby in the early 2000s
1:40:57
Would spend eight hours a day on computers, a passion since age five, whether for economic reasons or not
1:44:08
AI may make good judgment more valuable
1:45:27
Developers may no longer command high compensation just for being a bottleneck

Chapters

Intro
00:00
Omarchy and Ruby on Rails
02:11
37signals overview
08:25
Launching HEY
10:12
Building HEY
18:38
Designers at 37signals
22:47
The craft of design
28:08
Why DHH now embraces AI workflows
31:52
The AI inflection point
39:45
DHH’s agent-first workflow
44:23
AI’s impact on junior developers
55:09
Developer experience with AI
1:03:08
What does AI mean for developers?
1:16:43
37signals teams and hiring
1:23:33
Work-life balance with AI
1:38:20
Why DHH keeps building
1:41:41
Closing
1:45:24

Transcript

Gergely Orosz: How has the creator of Ruby on Rails changed how he builds software now with AI agents? David Heinemeier Hansson, often referred to as DHH, created Ruby on Rails, Omarchy, and is the co-founder of 37signals. He bashed capabilities of AI codi...