[sk221]

When I initially started learning Rails, I was feeling similar. I was concerned about code feeling like "magic" and things happening w/o my understanding.

However, I got more comfortable with it and soon, for the most part, I LOVED the way everything was structured. Other frameworks just felt off.

I credit a lot of this to just understanding the internals of how Ruby works. I highly recommend the Well Grounded Rubyist. If you go through it, you'll be comfortable digging through your code, gems, etc. Things won't feel like magic and you'll be able to pinpoint how and why things are happening in your application.

Rails is one of the most productive web frameworks out there and once you know how things work, you're off to the races.

That Elixir/Phoenix combo though...