David Heinemeier Hansson

Not to be confused with David Hanson (computer scientist).

David Heinemeier Hansson is a Danish programmer and racing driver. As a programmer, he is the creator of the popular Ruby on Rails web development framework and the Instiki wiki.^[2] He is also a partner at the web-based software development firm 37signals.

David Heinemeier Hansson
Hansson at the 2016 6 Hours of Silverstone
Born	(1979-10-15) 15 October 1979 (age 43) Copenhagen, Denmark
Occupation	Programmer^[1]
Employer	Basecamp
Known for	Ruby on Rails
Website	dhh.dk

Hansson co-wrote Agile Web Development with Rails with Dave Thomas in 2005 as part of The Facets of Ruby Series. He also co-wrote Getting Real, Rework, Remote, and It Doesn't Have to Be Crazy at Work with Jason Fried.

Programming career

In 1999, Hansson founded and built a Danish online gaming news website and community called Daily Rush, which he ran until 2001.^[3] After attracting the attention of Jason Fried by offering him help with PHP coding, Hansson was hired by Fried to build a web-based project management tool, which ultimately became 37signals' Basecamp software as a service product.^[4] To aid the development process, Hansson used the then-relatively obscure Ruby programming language to develop a custom web framework. He released the framework separately from the project management tool in 2004 as the open source project Ruby on Rails. In 2005, Hansson was recognized by Google and O'Reilly with the "Hacker of the Year" award for his creation of Ruby on Rails.^[5] After graduating from the Copenhagen Business School and receiving his bachelor's degree in Computer Science and Business Administration, Hansson moved from Denmark to Chicago, Illinois, U.S. in November 2005.^[6]

Racing career

24 Hours of Le Mans career
Years	2012 -
Teams	OAK Racing, Aston Martin Racing, Extreme Speed Motorsports, Proton Competition, Rebellion Racing
Best finish	8th (2013)
Class wins	1

David Heinemeier Hansson lists photography and race car driving amongst his many hobbies.^[7] He took part in the 2012 24 Hours of Le Mans driving for OAK Racing.^[8] He also drove a Morgan-Nissan P2 car for Conquest Racing in the American Le Mans Series (ALMS), winning two races in the season. Heinemeier Hansson joined OAK Racing full-time in 2013, taking five 2nd-place finishes to finish 2nd in the Trophy for LMP2 Drivers. During the 2017 24 Hours of Le Mans post-race technical checks, certain irregularities were detected on the Vaillante Rebellion team's #13 Oreca 07-Gibson, resulting in the car's disqualification. In July 2010 it was revealed that Heinemeier Hansson was the person that had commissioned the one-off Pagani Zonda HH supercar.^[9] He also commissioned the Koenigsegg Agera HH, which was sold in 2022 to Houston Crosta, a YouTube video creator in Las Vegas.^[10] Heinemeier Hansson also purchased an Aston Martin Valkyrie.

24 Hours of Le Mans results

Year	Team	Co-Drivers	Car	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
2012	OAK Racing	Bas Leinders   Maxime Martin	Morgan LMP2-Nissan	LMP2	341	14th	7th
2013	OAK Racing	Olivier Pla   Alex Brundle	Morgan LMP2-Nissan	LMP2	328	8th	2nd
2014	Aston Martin Racing	Kristian Poulsen   Nicki Thiim	Aston Martin Vantage GTE	GTE Am	334	17th	1st
2015	Extreme Speed Motorsports	Scott Sharp   Ryan Dalziel	Ligier JS P2-Honda	LMP2	329	28th	10th
2016	Abu Dhabi-Proton Racing	Khaled Al Qubaisi   Patrick Long	Porsche 911 RSR	GTE Am	330	28th	3rd
2017	Vaillante Rebellion	Nelson Piquet Jr.   Mathias Beche	Oreca 07-Gibson	LMP2	364	DSQ	DSQ
2018	Jackie Chan DC Racing	Ricky Taylor   Côme Ledogar	Ligier JS P217-Gibson	LMP2	195	DNF	DNF
2019	Jackie Chan DC Racing	Ricky Taylor   Jordan King	Oreca 07-Gibson	LMP2	199	DNF	DNF
2022	Inter Europol Competition	Pietro Fittipaldi   Fabio Scherer	Oreca 07-Gibson	LMP2	364	18th	14th
2023	Jota	Pietro Fittipaldi   Oliver Rasmussen	Oreca 07-Gibson	LMP2	316	24th	13th

Complete FIA World Endurance Championship results

Year	Entrant	Class	Car	Engine	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	Rank	Points
2013	OAK Racing	LMP2	Morgan LMP2	Nissan VK45DE 4.5 L V8	SIL 2	SPA 2	LMS 2	SÃO 6	COA 6	FUJ 3	SHA 2	BHR 2		2nd	132.5
2014	Aston Martin Racing	LMGTE Am	Aston Martin Vantage V8 GTE	Aston Martin 4.5 L V8	SIL 1	SPA 2	LMS 1	COA 2	FUJ 1	SHA 2	BHR 1	SÃO 2		1st	198
2015	Extreme Speed Motorsports	LMP2	HPD ARX-03b Ligier JS P2	Honda HR28TT 2.8 L Turbo V6	SIL	SPA 8	LMS 5	NÜR 6	COA 4	FUJ 4	SHA Ret	BHR 7		7th	62
2016	Abu Dhabi-Proton Racing	LMGTE Am	Porsche 911 RSR	Porsche 4.0 L Flat-6	SIL 5	SPA 6	LMS 2	NÜR 4	MEX 1	COA 5	FUJ 5	SHA 4	BHR 1	2nd	151
2017	Vaillante Rebellion	LMP2	Oreca 07	Gibson GK-428 4.2 litre V8	SIL 9	SPA 4	LMS DSQ	NÜR 4	MEX 5	COA 2	FUJ DSQ	SHA 3	BHR 3	8th	85
2018–19	Jackie Chan DC Racing	LMP2	Oreca 07	Gibson GK428 4.2 L V8	SPA	LMS	SIL	FUJ	SHA	SEB 1	SPA 6	LMS Ret		11th	40
2019-20	Team Project 1	LMGTE AM	Porsche 911 RSR	Porsche 4.0L Flat 6	SIL	FUJ 7	SHA 5	BHR 9	COA	SPA	LMS	BHR		23rd	20
2022	Inter Europol Competition	LMP2	Oreca 07	Gibson GK428 4.2 L V8	SEB	SPA	LMS 14	MNZ	FUJ	BHR				NC†	0
2023	Jota	LMP2	Oreca 07	Gibson GK428 4.2 L V8	SEB 5	PRT 7	SPA 9	LMS 13	MNZ 1	FUJ	BHR			7th*	53*

^† As Heinemeier Hansson was a guest driver, he was ineligible for points.

Complete European Le Mans Series results

(Races in bold indicate pole position; results in italics indicate fastest lap)

Year	Entrant	Class	Chassis	Engine	1	2	3	4	5	6	Rank	Points
2011	Lotus Jetalliance	GTE Pro	Lotus Evora GTE	Toyota-Cosworth 4.0 L V6	CAS	SPA	IMO	SIL NC	EST		NC	0
2013	Jota Sport	LMP2	Zytek Z11SN	Nissan VK45DE 4.5 L V8	SIL	IMO 5	RBR	HUN	LEC		17th	10
2019	Team Project 1	LMGTE	Porsche 911 RSR	Porsche 4.0 L Flat-6	LEC	MNZ	CAT 5	SIL	SPA	ALG	17th	10
2022	Inter Europol Competition	LMP2	Oreca 07	Gibson GK428 4.2 L V8	LEC 11	IMO 9	MNZ 11	CAT 16	SPA 2	ALG 4	10th	32

^* Season still in progress.

WeatherTech SportsCar Championship results

(Races in bold indicate pole position, Results are overall/class)

Year	Team	Class	Car	Engine	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	Rank	Points
2014	RSR Racing	PC	Oreca FLM09	Chevrolet LS3 6.2 L V8	DAY 9	SEB 2	LGA	KAN	WGL	IMS	ELK	VIR	AUS	ATL 9		24th	57
2015	Tequila Patrón ESM	P	HPD ARX-04b 1 HPD ARX-03b 2	Honda HR28TT 2.8 L V6 Turbo	DAY 10	SIR 9	LBH	LS	DET	S6H	MSP	ELK	COA	PET		21nd	45
2016	Starworks Motorsport	PC	Oreca FLM09	Chevrolet LS3 6.2 L V8	DAY	SEB 3	LBH	LGA	DET	WGL	MOS	LIM	ELK	COA	PET 6	20th	57
2018	3GT Racing	GTD	Lexus RC F GT3	Lexus 5.0 L V8	DAY 9	SEB 5	MDO 4	DET 12	WGL 4	MOS 7	LIM	ELK 12	VIR 8	LGA 7	PET 10	11th	213
2020	Tower Motorsport By Starworks	LMP2	Oreca 07	Gibson GK428 4.2 L V8	DAY 4†	SEB	ELK	ATL	PET	LGA	SEB 2					18th	32

^† Points only counted towards the Michelin Endurance Cup, and not the overall LMP2 Championship.

Recognition

• 2005: Won Best Hacker of the Year 2005 at OSCON from Google and O'Reilly for the work on Rails.^[11]
• 2006: Accepted the Jolt Award of product excellence for Rails 1.0.^[11]
• 2012: Named ALMS Rookie of the year.^[12]

References

1. The home screens of 37signals
2. DHH interviewed on the TV show Triangulation on the TWiT.tv network
3. Daily Rush
4. Douglas, Nick. "I'm David Heinemeier Hansson, Basecamp CTO, and This Is How I Work". Lifehacker. Retrieved 2018-03-20.
5. "Google-O'Reilly Open Source Awards - Hall of Fame". Google Code. Retrieved 2010-09-03. Best Hacker: David Heinemeier Hansson (Ruby on Rails and 37Signals)
6. Staff writer (March 9, 2014). . eTalks. Archived from the original on June 20, 2014. Retrieved April 30, 2015.
7. . Archived from the original on 2014-10-23. Retrieved 2012-07-02.
8. Mercier, Laurent (2012-04-18). [The crew of the #35 LMP2 2012 Morgan sold out]. Endurance-Info (in French). Infomaniak Network SA. Archived from the original on 2013-03-16. Retrieved 2012-04-18.
9. "Pagani Zonda HH". secretentourage.com. August 2010. Retrieved 2011-01-02.
10. Gary Bonanni (Oct 7, 2014). "One-of-a-Kind Koenigsegg Agera HH Spotted". carbuzz.com. Retrieved 7 October 2014.
11. About David Heinemeier Hansson 2011-06-02 at the Wayback Machine. Loudthinking.com. Retrieved on 2014-05-30.
12. . Archived from the original on 2013-06-02. Retrieved 2013-06-23.

External links

• - Hansson's weblog
• David Heinemeier Hansson on Twitter  
• 37signals
• Video of David Heinemeier Hansson presentation at Startup School
• David Heinemeier Hansson - The Pareto Principle and Stoic Philosophy on Developer on Fire
• on the Inside the Net Podcast
• Martin Fowler and David Heinemeier Hansson interview on Hanselminutes Podcast
• David Heinemeier Hansson interview in Danish 2012-07-23 at the Wayback Machine on Builder.dk Podcast
• on the Web 2.0 Show
• David Heinemeier Hansson explains Ruby on Rails at the university of Roskilde, in 2004
• on REST. July 9, 2006
• The Great Surplus - Keynote at RailsConf 2008 - Portland^{[permanent dead link]}
• Living with legacy software - Keynote at RailsConf Europe 2008 - Berlin
• FLOSS Weekly podcast 79 and its transcription 2014-11-29 at the Wayback Machine
• Podcast interview with David Heinemeier Hansson on This Developer's Life
• Podcast interview with David Heinemeier Hansson on the alphalist CTO podcast where he talks about Hey, the no-notification life and other thoughts on technical leadership. 2020

Sporting positions
Preceded by Jamie Campbell-Walter Stuart Hall	FIA Endurance Trophy for LMGTE Am Drivers 2014 with: Kristian Poulsen	Succeeded by Aleksey Basov Andrea Bertolini Viktor Shaitar