Back from Vacation

Aaron

Hello, Colleen.

Colleen

Hello, Aaron.

Aaron

We have very much to discuss because I think it's been, like, 3 weeks.

Colleen

Oh, it yeah. I think so.

Aaron

Because you were on vacation for a week, then I was on vacation the very next week. So maybe I think it has been 3 weeks total.

Colleen

Yeah. Quite a while.

Aaron

So a lot has happened. We've got a whole list here. At the top, I wanna start with some Tuple stuff. I know that you were on vacation, but we launched our first big marketing experiment that I was kind of in charge of, which was the open source, send an open source developer on vacation.

Colleen

I saw that.

Aaron

Yeah. It went great. Oh, that's awesome. Amazing. Yeah.

I was so I was so just relieved that it went so well, because I spent a ton of time working on, like, the social share images so that on Twitter, everyone would get their own card based on who they voted for.

Colleen

Can you explain that to me? Because I was on vacation, and I didn't really follow all of that. What happened?

Aaron

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So the the whole the whole deal is, like, you come to our site and you either nominate or vote for an open source developer to go on vacation. Right?

So you'd come to the site and say, like, I'm gonna vote for, Taylor Otwell, Adam Wadden, and somebody else. And then when you click, like, tweet so then, you know, we do this confirmation that says, great. Your votes have been counted. Do you wanna share it? Click this button to tweet it.

When you click that button, the social share image on Twitter includes the people that you voted for. Yeah. So, like, on the card itself, it'll say, I just voted for Taylor and Adam to go on vacation. Like, you should go vote for somebody. And so if you scroll through like, if you open Twitter and search tuple.app, and then just go to the live tab so you see them all, and you just scroll through, you'll see just 100 and 100 of tweets with every card is, like, distinct based on who they voted for.

Wow.

Colleen

Yeah. That is cool.

Aaron

Pretty pretty cool.

Colleen

How'd you do that?

Aaron

So it's like a it's like a native Twitter campaign almost.

Colleen

Right.

Aaron

Yeah. I did it with Netlify, actually. So the images are generated on a Netlify, like, serverless function. Mhmm. And then through some magic, like, edge functions, we inject a little bit of code into the HTML, that changes the OG image based on like a, like a unique identifier.

So all the links. Yeah. All the links point to the same page. But every image is is different based on who you voted. So pretty great.

I was pretty thrilled. I was pretty thrilled with how it went. It kind of took over Twitter for like 2 or 3 days. And, yeah, it was great. Ben was thrilled.

Everyone on the team was thrilled. We still have a lot of still have a lot of, like, work to do there because we still have to, you know, actually send the people on vacation, which is gonna be a lot of logistics work. But the the super fun part went really well. So I'm pumped about that.

Colleen

Nicely done.

Aaron

Very well. Thanks. Feels good. Feels good to have my first, like, big public thing go really well. Especially after, like, I don't know, 2 months of, like, working behind the scenes on stuff and to finally be like, no, no, no, really Look.

This works. That felt really good. So that was great. In other triple news, this is also good news. It's gonna sound like it's not, but it's also very good news.

I'm now halftime at Tuple. Yay. So yeah. So, I've been feeling for a while, like, you know, work working at Tuple. I was responsible for, like, all of the marketing.

And, you know, the original job application or job posting was, like, come do, like, developer y stuff that also happens to be marketing. And I was like, yeah. That sounds great. And then it kinda just, like, happens that everything marketing related got shifted over to me. And so I was doing all of this, like, standard marketing work that I'm just not that good at.

And I'd like more importantly, I don't wanna take my career towards standard marketing. And there, there are people who are really, really good at that stuff. And so I, I, you know, I've been talking to Ben all along and he's just incredibly like, gracious and helpful in this whole process. He was always asking, like, how are you feeling? Like, what are you working on?

Do you enjoy it? And it finally got to the point where it's like, you know, I'm doing a ton of pure marketing work that I don't feel like I'm that good at and I don't wanna spend my career doing. And I think Tuple would be better served if you had, like, a pure marketer, like, a head of marketing that was doing all of this stuff. And so we, you know, we talked about it over the course of many weeks and decided, like, yeah, I think I I think I, Aaron, should be doing more of the develop the pure developer stuff, and someone else should be doing the pure marketing stuff. And so we decided, great.

Let's, like, let's keep the band together, but I don't think that's a full time job. And so I'm gonna just, like, just do the developer marketing stuff for them and just, like, half time. So kinda worked out great for everybody. Because I think Tubal really does need, somebody that's more marketing than I am. But I really like working with them and I love this kind of stuff that I'm doing.

So I think it's gonna work out great.

Colleen

Aaron, this is the dream. Right? Yeah. It's a dream. Yeah.

Aaron

It really is.

Colleen

I mean, this is perfect.

Aaron

It is perfect. And, you know, Ben and I talked about Hammerstone, and I I've told him from the very beginning, it's, you know, at some point, I would like to be on my own. And so he's known that all along. And, like, I just think there's a really great opportunity here for me to do a bunch of stuff publicly, and build cool stuff for Tuple. And then in the other half of that time, build cool stuff, for Hammerstone.

And, like, it's not, you know, in a weird way, if I I wanna talk about Lyricon after. But, like, if I speak at Lyricon, that's, like, good for 2 people too. You know, if I you know, I'm going to this conference in Amsterdam for a PHP thing, and if I go there and speak about PHP, like, that's good for 2 people too. And so I feel like this is the best of best of both both worlds thing. So I'm I'm super pumped.

Colleen

Yeah. This seems like the perfect setup. Totally agree. Best of both worlds. You have a part time job to provide you a stable income.

Aaron

Mhmm.

Colleen

And then you have the rest of your time to really dive in and do a lot of the hammer stone stuff you've been wanting to do.

Aaron

Totally. And I think one of the things that I've, like, as I was doing a lot of this tubal work and, like, talking through everything along the way with Ben, one of the things that I realized was, like, I want to be doing more of the, like, the hardcore technical stuff. And that's, that's like one of the things that I found interesting was, you know, Ben was offering me the ability to grow into the head of marketing. Like, he was like, you can do this. And if if you want, if you want to do it, I will help you get there.

And you will end up with a team of marketers underneath you, and you will be the boss, which, like, incredibly flattering, very kind, but I realized that's not, like, that's not where I wanna end up. Like, I don't wanna end up as the head of marketing. I want to get more and more. So, yeah, I I think that's been a good realization for me. So, yeah, that's that's the big breaking news.

Colleen

That's amazing news. I'm so happy for you.

Aaron

Yeah. Thanks.

Colleen

It's gonna be great.

Aaron

Yeah. I think so. So, I guess this is the big announcement. I mean, I haven't said anything on Twitter. Surprise.

But yeah. So I think, you know, obviously, I'll need to make up the money, you know, because now I'm half time at 2 pole. Right. Hopefully, that will all come from Hammerstone eventually. But in the meantime, I'm also taking on a few, like, I really wanna focus on Laravel performance, including database and application side both.

And so I'm taking on a few Laravel performance consulting engagements. So Awesome. If anybody out there needs help with their performance in their Laravel app, let me Nice. So enough about me. What's going on over there?

How was your vacation?

Colleen

Oh, it was so good. So I'm a lifelong east coaster, so I have never been to Lake Tahoe. But if you live in California, like, everyone out here has been there before, it is stunning. I mean, it was just Yeah. It was amazing.

It's like a lake perfectly clear, like, 50 feet down with, like, snow capped mountains in the background. It was really nice.

Aaron

We had

a great time. Great. Good.

Colleen

Now I know why people, like, go to the mountains to, like, feel creative. Right? Like, you just get out of your environment, and you're like, I really wanted to work. I'm not gonna lie. I was, like, wow, I'm feeling so inspired and creative out here in the mountains.

Aaron

Yeah. So did you come back full of ideas?

Colleen

I did come back full of ideas. So it was great. It was it was really relaxing. I'm glad we did it. We had a wonderful time.

Oh, I have a story.

Aaron

Tell me.

Colleen

So we are in an Airbnb, and we we went with some of our friends. So there was actually, 2 other families that we met up there. So they 4, 8, 11 kids total. Yeah. We did not all stay together, which I think is the key to vacationing with friends is, stay in your own house.

But we're in this suburban neighborhood. We have an Airbnb, and in your, like, check-in documents, there's a whole page about bears. But you're like, nah. I gotta really have to worry about bears.

Aaron

Gonna happen to me. Yeah.

Colleen

It's not gonna happen to me. I am not kidding. We come home from the grocery store. We're in a neighborhood. It is the middle of the day.

Pull into the driveway. And my friend's car, which is parked right next to us in the driveway, look over and there is a bear that has broken the window of their truck in their car.

Aaron

What? I know. It broke the window? Oh, jeez.

Colleen

It was crazy. It was yeah. And then we're in the car, and it's like the bear's right there. And the first thought is, like, if the bear can break that window, the bear could probably break this window. Anyway, it was a lot of excitement.

Aaron

Jeez. That's terrifying. I've never heard a story of a bear breaking into a car.

Colleen

I gotta send you a picture. Like, it it was

Aaron

Yeah. Please do.

Colleen

Wild. And they claim so that the the people who the friends that own the car, they have, like, little kids. So they didn't leave any food in the car, but, you know, you got, like, pretzels and Goldfish in the car seat and all that stuff. So we assumed that Bear smelled that stuff, but broke the window, butt hanging out

Aaron

of the car. It was it was wild. Terrifying.

Colleen

It was wild. Like and I had the baby not the babies, but I had, like, the little kids with me, 3 little kids, like, 5 and under, and we're gonna go for a walk with popsicles. And I was like, I don't know if I can protect 3 kids from a bear at once.

Aaron

Nope. Maybe we should I don't know if you can protect 1 kid from a bear, Colleen.

Colleen

So that was wild.

Aaron

Bears are pretty strong.

Colleen

That was pretty wild. I I don't know that I've ever been that close to a bear in my life.

Aaron

Yeah. Definitely not.

Colleen

A lot. That was that was a that was a crazy day. How was the beach? What beach did you go to? Like

Aaron

Beach was great. We went to some beach in Florida

Colleen

Oh, you flew?

Aaron

With my wife's family. We flew with the twins.

Colleen

With the babies.

Aaron

Yeah. With the babies. It is hard work vacationing with kids. Oh, yeah. It is it's hard, man.

We had a ton of fun. Yeah. But, you know, we've done this trip before with no kids, and boy howdy, it is a lot, lot harder with kids.

Colleen

Yeah.

Aaron

I mean, the naps, the eating all the time, kids just eat like 6 times a day. And then the sunscreen and the sand and the sun on a baby. Yeah. Like, what is this worth it? So it was fun, but, yeah, it was, it's hard work.

Colleen

Yeah. I remember those days, especially when they're little, like, oh, it's a lot.

Aaron

Yeah. Of hustle. It's a

Colleen

lot of hustle. We we like to distinguish between vacations and family trips.

Aaron

Yes. This was a family trip Right. For sure.

Colleen

Family trip.

Aaron

So while I was there, this is quick. While I was there, I launched version 1 of single store for Laravel.

Colleen

Congratulations.

Aaron

Thank you. So I I tagged it. I mean, I had launched we'd release it a while back, but I finally tagged version 1. So that went super well. So I'm thrilled with that.

Wrote a quick start blog post for them, put it on their site. So that's one of the long running things I've been working on, and 1.0 is out the door. Congrats. Yeah. Thanks.

Feeling feeling good about that. And then, one other thing I wanna talk about is my new YouTube studio.

Colleen

Oh, yes. Tell me. Tell me about this.

Aaron

I think we had talked about maybe last time making more videos, like live streaming and making videos for refine and basically just being more public. And now now that I have the time, I've set up, like, a full on YouTube studio in here. And so the plan is I'm gonna, like, start doing live streaming stuff that I already needed to do, like building the demo site for Hammerstone, that kind of stuff. But just do it live. And then I will also do I will also start doing some Laravel YouTube videos, because I think there's just, there's just a lot of opportunity there.

I mean, it I I watched a whole bunch of videos on Laravel on YouTube, and there are some, like, there are some really good ones, but I S I just think there's so many topics that aren't covered, and aren't covered well, that it would be something that I could, I could tackle. So got a couple of like soft boxes. I got a real DSLR camera. Yeah. I'm all set up.

I'm ready to go. I'm ready to start recording.

Colleen

Wait. I wanna hear more about your setup. So is this a new camera?

Aaron

This is a new camera. So this is a Canon M50 camera. So it's a DSLR that's hooked into, the Elgato 4 k Cam Link. So it's like HDMI straight out of the camera into the computer. Then on either side, I've got these big light

boxes. And

then in front of me, I have a ring light. So if I turn off if I turn off these light boxes, you can see it gets a lot

Colleen

Oh, wow. The difference is quite Yeah. Extreme. Yeah.

Aaron

That's kinda what you would expect on a on a call. And then if I turn them back on, it looks like I'm a YouTuber.

Colleen

It does.

Aaron

It's weird. Right?

Colleen

Yeah. It's super weird.

Aaron

And then I have a light behind me, pointed down at my head that kind of fills, like, fills the background a little bit, and then a ring light right in front of me that, like, fills me a little more. Yeah.

Colleen

Where do you put the ring light on top of your monitor?

Aaron

It's hooked. It's mounted on the desk, and it has a pole that stands up, and it's behind the monitor.

Colleen

So you really put some effort into this.

Aaron

Oh yeah, I did. Yeah. I really did. I thought this is something, I mean, one it's fun, but 2, like, I feel like, how do I say this nicely? I feel like a lot of the videos on YouTube developer videos are just kind of thrown together.

Colleen

Right.

Aaron

And if you go watch, like, I don't know, personal finance or, you know, marketing videos or any of these other niches on YouTube, they're like really well done and really sharp. And I thought, what? I could do some of that. Like, I'm not going to become a expert video maker, but I could step it up a little bit.

Colleen

I like it. So does the new camera do the blurred background?

Aaron

Yeah. So the new camera, I have a a I got a new lens for it Okay. That makes the background blurry. So it's a really low f stop, I think is how you say it. And so it's focused, like, whatever it focuses on.

Everything else is super out of focus. Isn't that crazy?

Colleen

That is crazy.

Aaron

Yeah. So it's like, that's just all straight out of the camera. So there's no, like, AI processing or whatever. So it doesn't ever get wonky or anything.

Colleen

How much did how much did the whole setup cost ish?

Aaron

A lot of money, Connie. Money? It it cost it cost a lot of money. Yeah. I think the camera was, like, 5 or $600.

Wow.

Oh, yeah. It's a it's a Canon ID.

It's like a it's a Canon camera. I mean, it's a DSLR camera. Wow. Wow. And the lens was a couple hundred as well, and then all the lights and everything.

Yeah. It's expensive. Yeah.

Colleen

No. You look very crisp. Like, it's it's it's good.

Aaron

Feel very crisp.

Colleen

Yeah. It's good. Wow. That's exciting. Oh, man.

Yeah. That'll be fun.

Aaron

So look forward to many, many YouTube videos, hopefully, as I as I, recoup that cost over over the tens of cents I will make off of YouTube. Alright. Let's talk, what do you wanna talk about? Rails? Wanna talk about your call that you had?

Colleen

Well, let's talk about the Laravel sale first because that also happened while I was on vacation.

Aaron

That happened while I was on vacation too.

Oh, fun.

Yeah. So there's a guy in Laravel that I'm friends with boss man, Chris, and he's been waiting for react to be ready. And, you know, it's all open source since he's, I guess, been watching it or heard heard us talk about it on the podcast or something. And it was like, hey. What if I just buy it?

And he bought it. He just he just bought the back end because he heard React was ready and then sent me an email. I was like, hey. I can't figure out how to get it set up. And I was like, wait.

Did you already buy it? And he had, and so I sent him an email back that was like, here's usually I would try to get on call with you to help you with this, but since you already bought it, which is amazing. Thank you. Here's, you know, how I would do it. And then I said, let's get on a call and I can walk you through even more of it.

And I haven't heard back from yet. So either he got it set up and is thrilled or he's moved on to something else. So I'll reach out to him again. But yeah, he just like heard the react one was ready and bought the PHP one and did it all himself, which is pretty great.

Colleen

That's amazing. Love it.

Aaron

Yeah. I know. So made another sale, which is good. And I need to I need to finish I need to polish up some of the React stuff. Dave has gotten some more stuff done there, including browser tests, which is gonna be really nice.

So, yeah, React is ready. It's all it's all ready. We made a sale.

Colleen

Yay. That's wonderful news. So I had a call yesterday with, an analytics company that is very interested. Analytics companies are tough because they have such complicated requirements when they look at segmenting their user base.

Aaron

Right.

Colleen

And it was in Dutch, by the way. Did I share that part? So You did not. I mean, they spoke English perfectly, but, like

Aaron

Good. Yeah. Yeah.

Colleen

Yeah. No. No.

Aaron

The interface was all good.

Colleen

Able to communicate. No problem. But, it was kind of funny because they were trying to show me what they had. Not in English. So Yeah.

That was that was an added fun layer. And so I think it went really well. They, they seemed really excited about it. Something they're very interested in. They, their CTO wanted to kinda put together a few more specific questions about the tech because what they're doing now is they're doing the same thing our client is doing where they're pulling a list of IDs from one query and putting it into another query.

So we do that for our client because it's actually 2 different databases.

Aaron

Mhmm.

Colleen

But they do that because they said it's faster.

Aaron

Quizzical look on my face.

Colleen

So that was an interesting, I thought that was an interesting assertion, but I think he has Mhmm. My understanding from our call was he has, like, a database person. So the next step with them is they're gonna send me some questions and, maybe sit down maybe we'll sit down with their database person to kind of more fully understand their needs. They're very interested in this concept of the nested inline filters, which is something we have talked about for a while, but is a big lift for us. So they're very interested in that.

They think that would be great. I mean, you know, I think it's important to remember so this nested inline filter concept is this concept of you're on the contacts page and you want all contacts who have purchased products that meet a specific product filter.

Aaron

Mhmm.

Colleen

And you wanna build that out all on the same page. But I think in many of our use cases, like, I can make custom conditions or they can make custom conditions that meet a lot of their needs.

Aaron

I think so.

Colleen

Like, I don't I

Aaron

think that's true, and I think that's easier for them and easier for the end user.

Colleen

Yeah. Because the UI for this is gonna be tricky. You come in, you view a product, like, you get all those IDs on your event table, and I was able to build them a custom condition, which is all users that have viewed product with name whatever with whatever. But I think when they first thought of that, because you have that those 2 IDs, like, in the same clause, if you will, you think of it as a nested filter.

Aaron

Right.

Colleen

But it's really a custom condition. So so that's kinda what I'm thinking is, like, there are a lot of use cases. People are like, oh, nested filters. I'm like, I don't know that you really need that, that that's as high priority as you think it is. So it's Yeah.

Deal's something I wanna do, but I don't think it's gonna be a deal breaker.

Aaron

Yeah. No. I think and you told them, great. We'll have that buy buy right now. Right?

Perfect. Yeah. That I think that's the move. Because, I mean, if they need it or not is an open question. Could they get started without it?

Absolutely.

Colleen

Here, I mean, my take on all of this, Aaron, and this is what I told these guys, and, we are small and scrappy, and this is for both of us, our number one priority. So we are going to do everything we can to make this work for you, and if it doesn't, we'll sort it out. Like, we aren't gonna sell you something you don't need, but we, I mean, we want every single customer to be incredibly happy.

Aaron

Yes.

Colleen

So we're all in to make sure that happens. And if for any reason you aren't, like, we'll we'll sort it out. But I really think that the huge benefit to working with us is we are super commit it's not a huge company. Right? We we are Right.

You and I are 2 people who are super committed to making this work, so it's gonna work.

Aaron

Did you learn that from your sales YouTube videos? That was compelling.

No. I didn't. I wasn't. That was good.

Thank you. I'm I'm ready to buy. I think that was great.

Colleen

But it's also true. Right?

Aaron

Like I mean, of course. Yeah. That's the best part.

Colleen

No. I didn't. The sales YouTube videos were a little little slimier than that.

Aaron

Yeah. Well, that was good. I I applaud you. I like that line.

Colleen

So, I hope to hear back from them. I'll reach out with them. I mean, the last episode we did, what did you say? You said

Aaron

Follow-up or die?

Colleen

Follow-up or die. So I'll definitely add them to our list and, you know, follow-up with them and see if if it's a good fit. But, yeah, I'm excited. So I scheduled, I I scheduled the onboarding date with Ben, so that's, like, next week.

Aaron

Woah. I know. You told me

Colleen

to, so I did. Teammates.

Aaron

That's great. I love that. I love having power like that. That's great. That's so soon.

Colleen

I know. It's maybe the week after next, but it's, like, the next week or 2. I think the only thing we have to have before we put it on anyone's side is client side validations. Like, we just we've gotta have it. That is for me, I'm trying to I'm trying to, pick, like, one thing a week because what always happens to me is I think I can do all of these things, and software always takes longer than you think it's gonna take.

Yeah. This is just life. We all know this is true, and we all continue to lie to ourselves about how long it's gonna take. And so this week, like, validations are my number one priority. Gotta get that solved.

I was telling you before we before recorded that our contractor has done some great refactoring to use form objects, so, hopefully, that'll make this whole situation a little easier. The real struggle we're having with these client side validations is if we could just put the errors on the blueprint, it would, like, not be a problem.

Aaron

But I know.

Colleen

We're trying really hard not to do that because you really sold me with your the blueprint is the user's intent. So that's, like, the big push for me this week is we gotta get these validations because I'm onboarding Ben in, like, a week or 2, and, and that's really exciting. And, yeah, so so for on the rails side, I think a lot of the work right now, obviously, validations, and I have a list of, like, other tasks, but the a lot of it is gonna be this implementation. And I think, like, as we've talked about, like, as we start implementing it, what are the sticky points? Should we provide more wrappers around it?

I think we're I think we're gonna end up providing an optional wrapper with an apply discard button, which is totally fine.

Aaron

I think that's great.

Colleen

And one more thing we need. What we real another thing we really need is we need what they have requested, which I think is a great idea, is, like, pills that essentially show you what filter you currently have applied. So we need you and I need to think about how we wanna do that. Because, for example, when I demo this, I dump the SQL so people can can know what we're looking at. So what's happening with our client engineers, and our client is big, they have 50 engineers, I think we've mentioned that, is they'll apply a filter.

The user will come in and apply a filter or someone will be testing and they'll apply a filter, and then they won't remember they won't, like, know what they're looking at. We need to give them something, and and I almost think it's like I don't know. We need to think about it. They want something.

Aaron

I don't understand. Why can they not see the filter that they've applied? Because it's hidden in the popover?

Colleen

Right. Because you click filter, you say contact's name Colleen, apply, that window closes, and then all you see are contacts filtered by name equals Colleen, but you don't know that. Yeah. Okay. What they want is they want pills that would say name equals Colleen, and then you could x one out, and then it would clear.

So

Aaron

Interesting.

Colleen

We can talk about that offline, but, that's a big that's a big thing they've been requesting, and I think it's a great idea. I don't know that it's something, like, we'd provide the UI for that. I feel like

Aaron

Right.

Colleen

I I I feel like we would just provide we just need to provide some kind of data structure to let I don't know. We'll think about it. We need to think of talk about that a lot.

Aaron

The blueprint. You're you're basically rendering the blueprint again

Colleen

Right.

Aaron

In a different

Colleen

form. In a

Aaron

different form. Which, I mean, I know that they're using Hotwire, but in our React and or Vue versions, you could do that. You could have the same blueprint in 2 different places rendered completely differently, one super inline and one with more chrome around it. So, I mean, that's doable. I just don't know how you would do it on in Hotwire.

Colleen

Yeah. We'll talk about it. I'm I'm sure we can sort it out. I mean, that's so that's kinda like a the next thing. That's right, though.

We can just we'll sort that out. Yeah. So let's see. So validations this week, really wanna get that cleaned up, and then we have a couple little things. I've started thinking about how we wanna do, like, a demo site.

You had mentioned are you gonna livestream a demo site for Galermo site? Yeah. Very cool.

Aaron

Yeah. I'll be honest. That makes me that makes me nervous. Like, just just the concept of live streaming stuff makes me nervous, but I think it's good. I think it'll be

Colleen

It'll be good.

Aaron

I think it'll be good, and I think it'll be, it's kinda like a forcing function too. Like, I'm not gonna I'm not gonna dork around if I'm live streaming. I gotta get, like, I gotta get the stuff done. Right. So I think it'll be Are

Colleen

you gonna, like is that YouTube or Twitch or both?

Aaron

I'm gonna start on YouTube. I feel like Twitch is its own subculture that I don't really have time to learn right now.

Colleen

Okay.

Aaron

So I'm just gonna start on YouTube.

Colleen

Alright. So you have also on this list, Laracon Summer. What does that mean?

Aaron

Yeah. Laracon online is coming back again.

Colleen

Yay.

Aaron

Yeah. So they're doing summer edition, and I wanna I wanna submit a talk, and I don't know what to submit. So what should I do? I wanna do something like database slash performance related. But what should I do?

Colleen

I don't know. Can you take something from I mean, do you wanna do something like can you take something from one of your consulting engagements?

Aaron

Probably. Yeah.

Colleen

I mean, I really like the the talks where it's, like, solving this problem where the database is locking up, walking through the queries, or walking through the the app to figure out, like, in Rails, we have a lot of things that like, I guess, I don't obviously know that much about Laravel, but in layer in Rails, we have a lot of, like, common mistakes people make when because we don't think about performance until we have to. So designing for performance. Interesting. That's what it should be. Design for performance upfront.

Aaron

That is a pretty good title. I like that.

Colleen

I think that would be

Aaron

Well, that was easy.

Colleen

That was easy.

Aaron

I just gotta build a whole talk around it, but I think I can do that.

Colleen

I think you can do that. Totally do. Well, that's fun.

Aaron

Cool. Yeah. We'll see. I mean, might as well submit something. We'll see if, it gets chosen.

Colleen

Yeah. And your talk in where? Europe somewhere this fall?

Aaron

Yeah. Beld Antwerp.

Colleen

Okay. What's that one on?

Aaron

That's on Sidecar.

Colleen

Okay. Cool.

Aaron

Very nice.

Yeah. I need to I need to prepare. I need to update that, but it's not, you know, I'm not creating it from scratch, so that'll be

Colleen

Okay. So when are we ready to, like, really start pushing on some of this Laravel marketing stuff? Like, we have a whole list of things

Aaron

that does that mean?

Colleen

That means hold on. I got a list. Emailing the Laracon list, reaching out to the Laravel news people, doing a product hunt launch. I think we should do all these things. I don't know that we need to do them right now, but where is your comfort level with supporting, like, a big push for the Laravel product?

Aaron

Pretty high. Okay. Let me think. So big push. What do we need?

So I think it may be useful to divide that between what do we need on the marketing side and what do we need on the technical. I think on the technical side, we don't need anything.

Colleen

Okay.

Aaron

Like, on the technical side, we're we're totally ready. Save for front end documentation, which spans both technical and

Colleen

Okay.

Aaron

We do need some front end documentation, like how to use Vue and how to use React. So in that regard, I feel great. Totally ready. I think on the marketing side, we do need the demo site.

Colleen

I was just thinking, Matt.

Aaron

Yep. Because I I and maybe this is, like, me being afraid or something, but I really don't wanna push super hard before we have the demo site there because I feel like that's been a pretty common refrain from people that we've tried to pitch it to. It's like, can I play with it? It's like, no. We can get on a call, and I can show you.

And, like, I just wanna see the thing. So would we need anything else beyond that? I don't I I don't think so. What do you think? Am I missing something?

Colleen

I think the demo site's really important. And can I have a quick segue here? Okay. So this is a little embarrassing, but I think I told you I've started following Gary v on the Internet.

Aaron

Oh, wow. Yeah. Okay. Wow.

Colleen

And I know it's

Aaron

a lot I'm excited. I have no idea where this is going, but I know it's gonna be great. So please continue.

Colleen

So he had this post the other day, and it was this concept of time. And his argument was, as humans, our number one failing is we don't properly think of time. Like, we don't think of time in the proper context. And K. His point was he's 45, I think, so older than both of us, obviously.

Aaron

Obviously.

Colleen

But his point was so people in their twenties or people who are trying to do some like, they just kill themselves, and they think they have no time to do something

Aaron

of

Colleen

in that career. And so I feel like so, basically, like, the post the concept was, like, you have more time than you think you do, so use it wisely. Use it intelligently. Still push as appropriate, but be smart about it. So that made me think of us because we are in a sprint.

Right? And I am happy to be in this sprint. That is where I want to be, but I feel like we are on the cusp of, like, something great. And everyone keeps telling us to move faster.

Aaron

They do.

Colleen

So everyone keeps telling us to move faster, but I think if we're not careful, we could bungle it.

Aaron

K. Tell me more.

Colleen

So for example this is a perfect example. Like, we could launch on Product Hunt Friday. Right? Like, or whatever. We could go really, really hard right now, but, like, I think these little things, like, yes.

It's worth to wait 2 weeks to have a demo site. Same thing with Rails. Like, yes. It's worth to wait a month to have like, we've come so far and the product is so good. We gotta nail the landing.

Like, we don't wanna bungle it now by pushing something out or doing a huge marketing push when we're, like, 98% done. That's what I mean.

Aaron

I fully agree with that.

Colleen

Okay. Cool.

Aaron

Yeah. I think there's a balance, of course, to be struck between waiting forever

Colleen

and

Aaron

launching soon, but I do think, I do think that the point that we're aiming for is not, asymptotic. Like, it's not forever moving away from us. They're, like, demo site. We just need to have It's

Colleen

a thing.

Aaron

The demo site.

Colleen

Right.

Aaron

And then we can we can start expending some of this marketing, energy. Yeah. That's really interesting. I it's funny you say that because I do feel like everyone's always saying, like, go faster. Just do it.

Like, just release it right now. What's the worst that could happen? It's like, I mean, probably nothing bad, but it would be better, and I would feel better about it if we were, like, ready to launch when it was time to launch.

Colleen

Yeah. And I I think, absolutely, there's a balance, and, of course, that is excellent advice because we do need to launch something. I mean, we have. It's launched. Like, you can buy it now.

Aaron

Yeah.

Colleen

But I I I do think it's worth it. Like, here we are so close to being ready to do all these things. If it takes a couple more weeks to have a demo site, like, think that kind of stuff is worth it because, yeah, like I said, you don't wanna botch the landing. You've come this far. I I and I really feel like Hammerstone is just such a different product because it's so good.

And I could say that because I have another product that I launched early. It's

Aaron

Yeah. I think, I I agree with that. And I think if there's any criticism, it's that the product is too good and the marketing is too anemic.

Colleen

Yeah.

Aaron

So I think that and and that's what we're trying to, you know, correct right now. It's like, let's let's get the marketing assets ready because you'll as you heard, I don't think there's anything technical that needs to be done. Like, on my side, I I I don't think any of the product needs to be touched, and it, you know, frankly, it hasn't been touched in a month or 2 because I don't think there's anything there. And so now it's like the thing that needs to be done is just these very basic marketing things, and then we can push for real. Which is not to say that we haven't been, you know, trying to do the 1 on 1 sales stuff.

Colleen

I think that's been going pretty well, by the way. Like, I feel I have so with the Rails founding customers, 2, 3, and I feel like that's been going pretty well, and I'm pretty happy with that because I still feel like, like I've said, we have some iterations with this stimulus, like, how much we wanna ship, what kind of wrappers we wanna ship with it. So I'm feeling pretty good about that.

Aaron

I agree. So I think we're in a good spot. I'm glad you don't feel the need to get it out today. I think we both we both have a sense of I think we both have the sense of urgency, and so we don't need to be pushing towards urgency because that's where we are

Colleen

Yeah.

Aaron

Already.

Colleen

Agree. So demo site, what's your what's your timeline on that?

Aaron

I don't know. I mean, I think I could probably get that done, and I need to find a source for data. Like, I need to find a compelling source for data. I could use, like, the MySQL sample database. I could probably grab, like, a I think there's some open datasets for, like, like, movies, books, authors, that sort of stuff.

So I need to find data. I need to make a new Laravel app, pull refine in. I I really don't think it'll take that long. Okay. And I guess we could host it on vapor, which is Laravel's thing, because the main site is already hosted on vapor.

That may be that may be my, like, my thing for next week.

Colleen

Okay.

Aaron

Because there's a little bit of, like, bonus work around it and that I'm going to try to, like, learn how to stream along the way. Right. And so that adds, you know, 15%. But, yeah, I'll do I'll do that for next week. That'll be my thing for next week.

Colleen

Okay.

Aaron

Do you have strong opinions on anything about the demo site? I mean, it's gonna be pretty it's gonna be pretty basic.

Colleen

I think it should look good.

Aaron

Yeah. It'll look, you know, tailwindy, but it's not gonna be it's not gonna be much beyond, like, filtering.

Colleen

Yeah. That's fine. I think people are people you're gonna are you gonna set it up in such a way that people can, like, edit the filters and see what happens when they edit the filters? I think you're muted.

Aaron

Oh, you mean edit the, like, the PHP? Like, the filter itself?

Colleen

Oh, okay. No. It's fine.

Aaron

I wasn't. Should I?

Colleen

Not if it adds, you know, another week to your not to start. That was kinda what I've been thinking, though, is it would be pretty cool if people could see, like, how to edit filters and, like, actually build out new filters and things like that. Yeah.

Aaron

I mean, that would be extremely cool.

Colleen

But but but I think any demo site is good right now.

Aaron

I think that's a quagmire. Okay. I think live live editing, PHP files in a sandbox, and let me think about that. There may be some workarounds. I know that there's a I know that there are a few Laravel playgrounds online that could do that sort of thing, but that that may be a quagmire that's not worth it right now.

Colleen

Okay. Yeah. I I do not think it's worth it if it's gonna delay you.

Aaron

Okay. Then we'll say no because it would definitely delay me.

Colleen

Okay. Let's say no then. Yeah. Because I'd like to get that I think we would need to get that up and then we can start doing some of this marketing stuff, and that'll that'll be good.

Aaron

Cool idea, though. That'd be pretty awesome. Speaking of demo sites, are you are you planning on doing one?

Colleen

Yes. So I've been thinking about the demo site. I actually thought it's interesting. I'm glad we're talking about this because I can get bullet trains set up. You can open it with Gitpod, and I had thought it'd be cool to let people edit the filter so they could see how that works.

And since bullet train is now open source, we could put our package in there and kind of what I had built for the workshop. I mean, that was the reason I spent so much time building that workshop is because I want to take essentially what I built for the workshop and turn it into, like, a demo playground. So with Gitpod, bullet train, a few things I need, I think, to make that better, data. That's a good call. Mhmm.

And the UI is kinda you saw it. Like, I'm not really happy with the UI right now, and it's not our UI. It's the bullet train UI that sits on top of the filter. But, like, the filter button's in a weird place, and I only put it on one page. So my thought had actually been to do that first.

Aaron

That's just being

Colleen

The Gitpod the Gitpod bullet train integration first.

Aaron

Yeah. I think that sounds great. I mean, you're already so close.

Colleen

I'm so Right.

Aaron

Even better.

Colleen

It's so close to being done. So all I need to do is get it set up on a stand alone repo, host it, get some real data in there, and clean up the UI. And once we have validations, I think that's a playground at least. I think we also need a demo site, probably. Let's see how this plays out.

But what you can do what I can do is I can okay. So I can have the demo site and then oh, this is it. This is just the

Aaron

Tell me.

Colleen

You have the demo site, and then you have a link to the repo that you can open with Gitpod that you can edit and play with.

Aaron

That sounds pretty good.

Colleen

That's the move. So I

Aaron

like that.

Colleen

Yeah. Just something like I feel like with demo sites, like, some kind of interesting data you were just talking about this. But Yeah. It'd be fun to have, like, something funny or something, like, just more entertaining than

Aaron

Right.

Colleen

Like, we should look at

Aaron

also has to have relationships and

Colleen

Right.

Aaron

Yeah. So There's there's plenty of open data sources we could use.

Colleen

Yeah. I think we should give that a sec. Let me well, you're gonna do yours first because you're gonna start working on it this week. So let me know what you decide on.

Aaron

Okay. But I

Colleen

think we can have a little fun there, and, and that could be cool.

Aaron

Yeah. I think that's gonna be cool. Anything else? Okay. We'll call it there.