Ryan Stawarz & Austin Story: Inside Doximity’s 15-Year Rails Monolith

In this episode of On Rails, Robby is joined by Ryan Stawarz and Austin Story from Doximity, where Ruby on Rails has powered the core of their platform for over 15 years. The trio digs into how a single Rails monolith has evolved to support 100+ engineers and a mobile-first experience for millions of healthcare professionals. From front-end framework migrations to API architecture, they explore the real-world decisions required to keep a large Rails app resilient and fast-moving.

Ryan and Austin walk us through the team’s adoption of GraphQL, what led them to introduce GraphQL Federation, and how they balance speed with reliability when scaling APIs across domains. They talk about the tradeoffs of maintaining both GraphQL and REST, and how Doximity avoids N+1 query pitfalls using BatchLoader. The conversation also touches on the evolution of their front-end—from Backbone to Vue.js—and why Rails’ flexibility still gives them an edge.

Throughout the episode, they share pragmatic insights into debugging at scale, managing one-off data migrations, and determining when a service should live inside or outside the monolith. They also reflect on their use of tools like Packwerk, AnyCable, and Departure, and how a culture of trust, documentation, and lightweight planning helps Doximity move fast without breaking things.
Episode Highlights
- *[00:01:20]* – What keeps Ryan and Austin “On Rails”
- *[00:06:48]* – Why Doximity still relies on a Rails monolith at scale
- *[00:10:10]* – The early decision to adopt GraphQL in a Rails codebase
- *[00:14:25]* – How Docs Tasks help generate realistic data for debugging
- *[00:17:40]* – GraphQL Federation and simplifying deploy complexity
- *[00:21:05]* – Lessons from working with gRPC and REST alongside GraphQL
- *[00:25:20]* – Choosing Vue.js for frontend development in a large Rails app
- *[00:32:40]* – Using Packwerk to define boundaries in the Rails monolith
- *[00:36:45]* – How Doximity balances experimentation and architectural clarity
- *[00:41:15]* – Real-time Rails with ActionCable and AnyCable
- *[00:44:10]* – Internal tools that shape how engineering works at scale
- *[00:47:30]* – How the `departure` gem enables safer DB migrations
- *[00:54:25]* – Advice for smaller Rails teams dealing with scale
- *[01:08:30]* – Favorite engineering books and closing reflections

Show notes:
Ryan’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryanstawarz/
Austin's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rubyprogramming/
Ruby on Rails – The web framework powering Doximity’s monolith and many of their services https://rubyonrails.org/
GraphQL-Ruby – Ruby gem for building GraphQL APIs in Rails https://graphql-ruby.org/
BatchLoader – Helps reduce N+1 queries in GraphQL https://github.com/exAspArk/batch-loader
Vue.js – Their chosen frontend framework for building single-page applications https://vuejs.org/
Packwerk – Helps enforce modular boundaries in their Rails monolith https://github.com/Shopify/packwerk
Departure – Used for safe database migrations on large datasets https://github.com/departurerb/departure
Thor – Used to run one-off CLI scripts with easier testability https://github.com/rails/thor
rake-ui – Internal tool for triggering Rake tasks via a web UI https://github.com/doximity/rake_ui
AnyCable – Go-based replacement for ActionCable to support realtime features at scale https://anycable.io/
Docker – Powers consistent local dev and containerized environments https://www.docker.com/
Firebase – Used for push notifications in mobile apps https://firebase.google.com/
React and Angular – Evaluated alongside Vue during frontend selection https://reactjs.org/ and https://angular.io/
Backbone.js and CoffeeScript – Previously used before modernizing https://backbonejs.org/ and https://coffeescript.org/
Turbo – Explored as an alternative in specific parts of the platformhttps://turbo.hotwired.dev/
#RubyOnRails #Rails #RailsCore #Doximity #OnRailsPodcast #webdev #tech

‘On Rails’ is a podcast focused on real-world technical decision-making, exploring how teams are scaling, architecting, and solving complex challenges with Rails.

‘On Rails’ is brought to you by the Rails Foundation, and hosted by Robby Russell of Planet Argon

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