As engineers, most of the software we build is built for a specific purpose. Whether to serve web pages or solve math equations, that purpose makes our code meaningful and easy to comprehend. But under the hood, it is generic software - software that solves whole classes of problems at once - that powers our applications. Ruby has one of the most vibrant ecosystems of such software, but good luck studying its design principles in any tutorial or coding school. Instead, join me for a dive into this mysterious, hidden world, and learn to contribute where it counts: at the root of the problem