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Zil Norvilis
Zil Norvilis

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Why I Chose Ruby on Rails to Build Launchzilla.net

When I set out to create Launchzilla.net — a platform to help creators and entrepreneurs launch and sell their products — I had one major goal in mind: ship something useful, fast, without sacrificing long-term maintainability.

I’ve worked with different stacks before, but Ruby on Rails stood out for a few key reasons.

1. Convention Over Configuration

One of the biggest productivity boosts with Rails is its “convention over configuration” philosophy. I don’t have to waste time setting up folder structures, naming patterns, or boilerplate. Rails assumes the sane defaults, which means I can go from idea → working feature in hours, not days.

2. Rapid Prototyping

Rails is incredibly fast for turning ideas into working prototypes. Whether it’s user authentication, database-backed features, or simple admin dashboards, I can pull in a well-maintained gem or use Rails’ built-in generators to get it done. This was critical in Launchzilla’s early days, where speed was everything.

3. A Mature Ecosystem

With Rails being around for nearly two decades, the community is huge and incredibly helpful. If I need an integration for payments, background jobs, file uploads — chances are, there’s already a gem for it, battle-tested and ready to go.

4. Clean, Readable Code

Ruby’s syntax is elegant and expressive, making my codebase easier to maintain. I can come back to a piece of code weeks later and still understand what it’s doing without deciphering a mess of symbols and brackets.

5. Built-in Best Practices

Rails quietly enforces good habits — MVC structure, RESTful routes, database migrations — without feeling restrictive. It gives you structure without locking you into a “Rails-only” mindset.

6. Focus on the Product

At the end of the day, Launchzilla is about helping creators launch and grow their ideas — not about wrestling with infrastructure. Rails lets me spend my mental energy on the features and experience, rather than low-level plumbing.


Final Thoughts
In 2025, there’s no shortage of frameworks to choose from. But for me, Ruby on Rails strikes the perfect balance between developer happiness, speed, and scalability. Launchzilla.net wouldn’t have gone from concept to reality this quickly without it.

If you’re thinking about starting your own project and want something that’s both powerful and a joy to work with, Rails is still worth a serious look.


I can also make this more personal and story-like, showing your thought process step-by-step and some mini “lessons learned” from Launchzilla’s build. That would make it even more engaging for DEV.to readers. Would you like me to do that?

Top comments (1)

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Jesper Høy

I can also make this more personal and story-like, showing your thought process step-by-step and some mini “lessons learned” from Launchzilla’s build. That would make it even more engaging for DEV.to readers. Would you like me to do that?

This just makes me so sad :-(