Warrior? That’s a bold statement, and possibly widely discarded by DHH himself and the industry at-large. Really, though, think through the HerosJourney, what are the basic traits of the Hero – courage, vision, principles.

DHH on courage.
The article RailsIsOmakase presents an underlying trait of DHH – courage to stand his ground, regardless of the hell-and-high-water that will come. For 10-years on he has stood by the principles of Rails, and really more personally, has stood by his own principled views, even in the face of wild backlash over his own bold statements in RailsConfPresentations.

DHH with vision.
Well, an easy seque from the discussion of courage – DHH has held the constant vision from the very start of where Rails fits in the wider arena of Web Frameworks, and that vision has been maintained through the years.

DHH as principled.
Courage and Vision need to be grounded on principles. Like Omakase, there are certain decisions that can be ceded and compromises that can be achieved, yet a set of main rules and guides drive the overall path of development and change over the Rails framework. There are a multitude of examples of this, and DHH has led the 37Signals team with principled vision through so many successful projects.

Whether DHH would consider himself to have ever been the Warrior of any Hero’s Journey is not really the point. We can celebrate his guidance and vision for the Rails project and by extension our Rails community by that name anyway, since what we can truly celebrate is the Courage, Vision, and Principled Guidance that DHH has given to us all these years.

Thanks David!