Stream-Framework VS Devise

I have looked into a getstream.io integration, however it seems that the Ruby SDK is really treated as a second class citizen. There's bugs with the documented API (I'm having issues even creating users and querying users), the usage of the gem is low and there is an open issue since May that no one has even looked at, which doesn't give me hope for long term support.

An ultralight social media app with no dependencies that can run on shared web hosting. It's an API like Getstream, so F/E is up to you. I've had a fork of it in production for 2.5 years on a subscription site that generates a small income.

Now, I'm seeking your advice and opinions. If you have experience using Stream or MirrorFly for chat implementation, I'd greatly appreciate any insights you can provide. Here are some questions I have:

Think about the edge that you can have over thousands other people looking for a job like you. One of the ways to do it – tailor your (even small) experience to the company you are applying to. E.g. Let's take a company like Stream that have an open-source Swift SDK, try to contribute to their SDK, maybe close some `good-first-issue`s here and there, do some documentation improvements, enrich their example app. So that when you feel like you are ready to knock their door – you already have an edge over others – you don't need onboarding (because you already know most of their codebase, you even completed your first few tasks while yet not being employed!)

This is absolutely absurd. I mean I 100% believe it happens, it's just absurd that the Tier 1 admin bot is this bad.

I too firmly believe the tier 1 admins are just this program - https://getstream.io/ And reddit doesn't want to admit that humans are not actually reviewing things

Really depends on so many variables, and comes down to knowing the audience. I built a lightweight social network api platform to do a lot of what getstream.io and OSSN does, but the way users engaged with it was nothing like what I expected. One use case, for example, would have been mostly satisfied with WordPress and Mailchimp. Forums are very familiar to people and still used by a lot of "I don't do social media" types. At the risk of making a sweeping generalization, if you have an older target audience they will be happy with a forum. If you have a younger target audience they will prefer the sequential post / react style of interacting, like Discord or Instagram.

However for smaller apps it might be an overkill. In "real-life" production systems, overengineering is one of the biggest crimes. This is true any framework and technology, so in Rails you might want to use Rodauth since it is big and interesting and challenging, but then again, if you are building a simple greenfield MVP you do not have the time or need, for a big, complex solution. In those cases Rails developers usually go for Devise. It is one of the most known Rails gems, in multiple Rails surveys it was both number 1 in popularity, likability and "most frustrating" rankings.

Since Rails 7, there's more and more tooling that enables us, developers, to roll our own authentication. Devise is great and has been an amazing companion over the years. It also has this neat little feature - an authenticated route constraint which "hides" certain routes from people that are not signed in.

[changelog] https://github.com/heartcombo/devise/blob/main/CHANGELOG.md [upgrade guide] https://github.com/heartcombo/devise/wiki/How-To:-Upgrade-to-Devise-4.9.0-%5BHotwire-Turbo-integration%5D

As much as this article is about user authorization, there's something important we need to cover: user authentication. Without it, any authorization policies we try to define later on will be useless. But there is no need to write authentication from scratch. Let's use Devise.

With around 50 new gems released daily, it is common to use trending libraries for managing everyday tasks. You probably use Devise for authentication, Cancan for authorization, Kaminari for pagination, or run tests with Rspec.

Devise is an authentication library built on top of Warden, a Rack-based authentication framework.

devise: An authentication library designed for Rails

I used Devise, this is a Ruby on Rails app

In this article, we will explore how to implement authentication in a Rails 7 application using the popular devise gem. Authentication is a crucial aspect of web development, allowing users to securely access and interact with your application. By following this step-by-step guide, you will learn how to set up devise, configure authentication routes, create user models, and enhance your application with authentication features.