Developer On Fire

Guest: James Sturtevant @aspenwilder James Sturtevant talks with Dave Rael about a unique career path, working with troubled kids, and the power of mastermind groups to help one another achieve James (@aspenwilder) works for Microsoft where he partners developers to explore the latest technologies. Prior to Microsoft, he worked in the web development space for 10+ years working with startups and enterprises to improve the way they do business through technology. Recently he has been taking an interest in combining mobile development with backend services as a way to deliver unique experiences. When he isn’t practicing his software craft James can be found running through the woods, climbing mountains, or hiking with his daughters. Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and James Sturtevant - James's job at Microsoft - The experience of James and Dave meeting in the speaker room at an event - The things that "light James up" - James's background in Computer Engineering (not Computer Science) - How James got started in software - The appeal of mobile and James's experiences with it, including a story of great humanitarian impact - James's story of failure - challenged with unemployment, depression, and limited options - James's success story - progressing from inability to find a job in software to learning core competencies and valuable skills to working for Microsoft; getting involved in the community - How James got into blogging, speaking at conferences and user groups, and organizing user groups; including the utility of a mastermind group in James's story and in making progress generally - James's introduction to the mastermind concept and the benefits - Effective Mastermind groups (see Resources for Floyd Hilton's blog post on the subject) - James's book recommendation - How James stays current with what he needs to know - The things that have James most excited - James's causes of pain and suffering - James's family - The things about which James likes to geek out - James's top 3 tips for delivering more value - Keeping up with James Resources: James's Blog Rob Conery on Developer On Fire The Imposter's Handbook - Rob Conery Microsoft Acquisition of Xamarin Urban Refuge - Student Project at Boston University to Aid Refugees Microsoft Description of the Xamarin Solution for Urban Refuge Links and Slides from Dave's Lightning Talk on Getting Involved to Which James Referred John Sonmez's Free Blogging Email Course John Sonmez's Blogging Course Comanion Workbook Punch Fear In The Face Book - Dave Rael Floyd Hilton on the Mastermind Concept and Benefits Floyd Hilton on Lynda.com Michael Hyatt Amazon Echo Donovan Brown on Developer On Fire focus@will Music to Code By - Carl Franklin James's book recommendation: Code Complete: A Practical Handbook of Software Construction, Second Edition - Steve McConnell Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship - Robert C. Martin James's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Listen - Really listen Ask questions - use "Can you tell me a little bit more about that?" Do one thing at a time

Guest: Bryan Cantrill @bcantrill Bryan Cantrill talks with Dave Rael about public clouds, Bryan Cantrill is the CTO at Joyent Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and Bryan Cantrill - Bryan's opinion of formal computer science education and the importance understanding what lies beneath the abstractions we consume - Bryan's role and the nature of Joyent - Bryan's thoughts on the economics of on-premise computing and the collapse of it's use int the face of public cloud enthusiasm - Joyent's approach to openness and preventing lockin - How Bryan got started in software - Bryan's story of failure - attitude toward defects and the impact on personal confidence - The pitfall of having a fixed mindset among gifted individuals and the importance of persistence - Taking action and speaking your mind - Bryan's philosophy of parenting and what parents can control - Bryan's book recommencations - Bryan's top 3 tips for delivering more value - Keeping up with Bryan Resources: Bryan's Blog Joyent Joel Spolsky on Leaky Abstractions Jurassic Park: A Novel - Michael Crichton The Joyent Blog Post on Being Acquired by Samsung John the Baptist Amazon Web Services Snowball Amazon Web Services Snowmobile Joyent's Container Service: Triton IBM System/360 Model 67 Thomas J. Watson Jr. Larry Weed IBM PC XT DOS Bryan at Monktoberfest 2016 on Oral Tradition in Software Engineering Jim Gray "Problems worthy of attack prove their worth by fighting back." - attributed here to Piet Hein Rocky Balboa - Motivational/Inspirational Speech To Son (relevant to Bryan's emphasis on persistence and moving forward against resistance) Bryan's book recommendation: The Soul of A New Machine - Tracy Kidder Sloan Technology Series The Making of the Atomic Bomb: 25th Anniversary Edition - Richard Rhodes The Invention That Changed the World: How a Small Group of Radar Pioneers Won the Second World War and Launched a Technical Revolution - Robert Buderi Dream Reaper: The Story of an Old-Fashioned Inventor in the High-Tech, High-Stakes World of Mo dern Agriculture (Sloan Technology Series) - Craig Canine The Story of Mel ("The Last Real Programmer") - Ed Nather The Bug Count Also Rises - John Browne Execution in the Kingdom of Nouns - Steve Yegge Bryan's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Read more Write more Be persistent

Guest: Neal Ford @neal4d Neal Ford talks with Dave Rael about architecture, creativity, feasibility, and great writing Neal Ford is Director, Software Architect, and Meme Wrangler at ThoughtWorks, a global IT consultancy with a focus on end-to-end software development and delivery. He is also the designer and developer of applications, articles, video/DVD presentations, and author and/or editor of an increasingly large number of books spanning a variety of subjects and technologies, including the most recent Presentation Patterns. His professional focus includes designing and building of large-scale enterprise applications. He is also an internationally acclaimed speaker, speaking at over 300 developer conferences worldwide, delivering more than 2000 presentations. You can email Neal at nford at thoughtworks.com. Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and Neal Ford - The nature of architecture and whether it's still needed - Neal's sabatical after 10 years at ThoughtWorks - Working for ThoughtWorks and using software to make the world a better place - Neal the conference co-chair and the O'Reilly Software Architecture Conference - The things that "light Neal up" - How Neal got started in software - How Neal stays current with what he needs to know - Neal's enormous reading habit - Neal's book recommendations - Neal's story of failure - putting off delivering bad news and overlooking shortcoming of feasibility - Neal's success story - writing about evloutionary architecture - The things that have Neal most excited - The things about which Neal likes to geek out - Neal's top 3 tips for delivering more value - Keeping up with Neal Resources: The Architect in The Matrix The Matrix - the scene with The Architect Martin Fowler Article Including Ralph Johnson on Architcture as "Shared Understanding" Michael Nygard Architecture Decision Records - Nat Pryce Nat Pryce Rebecca Parsons O'Reilly Software Architecture Conference - Use Discount Code USRG for 10% off Avdi Grimm on Developer On Fire TRS-80 Clipper Programming Language Sierpinski Gasket Pat Kua on Developer On Fire Cruise to the Edge Hammock Driven Development - Rich Hickey David Heinemeier Hansson on Developer On Fire Neal's book recommendation: Infinite Jest: A Novel -- 20th Anniversary Edition - David Foster Wallace Consider the Lobster and Other Essays (including Authority and American Usage) - David Foster Wallace Neal's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Capture important descisions Leave room for creativity Find ways to get into the deep concentration flow state

Guest: Rob Conery @robconery Rob Conery talks with Dave Rael about dumb courage, family, dishonesty, hype, and the trap of mediocrity Rob Conery helps developers of all sorts learn what's new with technology. He has been working in the technology field full time since 1998 as a DBA and then a web developer. His original focus was the Microsoft ASP.NET stack, building tools like Subsonic and the first Micro-ORM: Massive. Currently he's working on MassiveJS, which is a dedicated PostgreSQL data access tool for Node. He ported this to Elixir and named it Moebius. While not writing data access libraries, he likes to write books. He just finished The Imposter's Handbook, which is a compendium of skills and concepts that you need to know as a self-taught programmer. Things like Complexity Theory (P vs NP), Big-O notation, Database theory, Algorithms and more. He tried to make it down to earth, using hand-drawn sketches and simple code samples. He recently founded Big Machine, where he plans to keep writing/selling books and videos. Before that he did videos for Pluralsight, which bought his previous company Tekpub.com. Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and Rob Conery - Rob's huge recent undertaking - writing The Imposter’s Handbook - motivations and mindset - Rob's approach to writing the book - The audience for The Imposter’s Handbook and the much too common problem of not admitting what we don't know - Willingness to be wrong, mediocrity, the many sides of risk - A revealing and insightful story of Rob taking action - illustrating the evaluation of risk, dumb courage, and perception - Dave's story of committing to publishing Developer On Fire - Rob's background, education, and how he landed in software - Rob's early web development - Rob's progression from a web development newbie to a valuable and valued professional - Rob's story of failure - inability to communicate the limitations of reality, having to let people go, getting fired, and tweaking Tekpub to its business detriment - Rob's success story - family, executing on the desire to live in Hawaii, traveling for a year with his family, writing The Imposter’s Handbook, and the social rewards from the gratitude of others - The deficiency of honesty in software development - How Rob stays current with what he needs to know and avoiding "hype by default" - Rob's book recommendations - Rob's tips for delivering more value - Keeping up with Rob Resources: Rob's Blog The Imposter’s Handbook - Rob Conery Big Machine - Rob's Business This Developer's Life - Rob's Podcast with Scott Hanselman Scott Hanselman on Developer On Fire Big O notation Karl Seguin The Little Redis Book - Karl Seguin P vs NP The Lambda Calculus NP hardness Song Exploder Hrishikesh Hirway The Martian - Andy Weir The Martian (Film) Harry Gregson-Williams (Music Composer for The Martian) Jason Fried on Staying Small Jon Skeet on Developer On Fire Jon Stewart on CNN/s Crossfire Neal Stephenson Rob's book recommendation: The Yiddish Policemen's Union: A Novel (P.S.) - Michael Chabon Pattern Recognition - William Gibson Version Control: A Novel - Dexter Palmer Rob's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Get over yourself Know you don't know Keep your ignorance as close as you can

Guest: Prosper Otemuyiwa @unicodeveloper Prosper Otemuyiwa talks with Dave Rael about inspiring and being inspired, positive outlook and great role models, and being lit up on software Prosper is a full stack software engineer and writer who’s worked on biometric, health, financial and developer tools. He currently works with Auth0 as a Technical Writer. Prosper is a firm believer in open source and grooming the next generation of software engineers who will change the world. He is adept at technical writing and breaking down complex concepts to be easily understood at all levels. Since starting his blog, goodheads.io, in 2015, he has churned out over 150 articles on PHP, Laravel and Javascript which has been featured in several newsletters around the globe. Previously, Prosper worked at Andela where he helped build the PHP, Laravel and Core Dev curricula that are currently being used in Nigeria and Kenya. He also trained and mentored Andela fellows to become solid and exceptional problem solvers. He likes to call himself a developer evangelist, constantly and passionately inspiring developers across Africa to be world class! Prosper is also a Google Developer Expert Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and Prosper Otemuyiwa - How Prosper became a Google Developer Expert - Prosper's engagement and quick rise to influence in software development communities in Africa and globally - Prosper's sources of inspiration - Taking action - Prosper, the inspiration, and the state of developer communities in Africa - The things that "light Prosper up" - Origins of Prosper's outlook and attitude - How Prosper got started in software - Prosper's story of failure - taking on too much and feeling despair and inadequacy - Prosper's success story - building cirriculum for training and being a champion for PHP and Laravel - Prosper's thoughts on having "made it" - How Prosper stays current with what he needs to know - Prosper's book recommendation - Prosper's causes of pain and suffering - The things about which Prosper likes to geek out - Prosper's top 3 tips for delivering more value - Keeping up with Prosper Resources: Prosper on GitHub Prosper on Medium Prosper on Facebook Andela Google Developer Experts Linda Lawton on Developer On Fire John Resig - Write Code Every Day Prosper's Post:One way to Greatness: Pick Yourself Qunicy Larson on Developer On Fire Prosper's Post: Human beings are Open-Source Projects Chilezie R Unachukwu Ofure Ukpebor Ayeni Olusegun Okubanjo Funsho Joel Spolsky's Blog - Joel on Software Next.js Vue.js nuxt.js Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind - Shunryu Suzuki Prosper's book recommendation: The Pragmatic Programmer: From Journeyman to Master - Andrew Hunt Prosper's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Take it one step at a time Every developer should have a niche - go deep on something Learn from other developers, including the brand new ones

Guest: Paul Merrill @dpaulmerrill Paul Merrill talks with Dave Rael about testing and automation, podcasting, business, and communication Paul Merrill is principal software engineer in test and founder of Beaufort Fairmont Automated Testing Services. Paul works with clients every day to accelerate their automated testing and sync up testing with development in agile environments. An entrepreneur, tester, speaker, and software engineer, Paul has a unique perspective on launching and maintaining quality products. He co-hosts Reflection as a Service, a podcast about software development and entrepreneurship. Follow Paul on Twitter @dpaulmerrill Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and Paul Merrill - Paul's motivations for specializing in automated testing - The types of testing Paul and Beaufort Fairmont do - Engaging with the domain - Podcasting and the Reflection As a Service Podcast - The things that "light Paul up" - Paul's entrepreneurial nature and the realities of being in business - Paul's story of failure - overengineering soluttions - premature abstraction - Another story of failure from Paul - trying to make a business that didn't work without understanding the market (or lack thereof) - Paul's success story - family, mentoring and sharing lessons, business, and podcasting - The importance of effective communication and the deficiency of it in software - Mutual benefit in teaching and learning interactions - How Paul stays current with what he needs to know - Paul's book recommendations - The things that have Paul most excited - The difficulty of vocabulary and using different terms in different ways - Paul's causes of pain and suffering - Paul's top 3 tips for delivering more value - Keeping up with Paul Resources: Paul's Business: Beaufort Fairmont The Beaufort Fairmont Blog Beaufort Fairmont Webinars Reflection As a Service Podcast Lisa Crispin on Developer On Fire Extreme Programming Explained: Embrace Change, 2nd Edition (The XP Series) - Kent Beck Robot Class in Java Succeeding with Agile: Software Development Using Scrum - Mike Cohn James Jeffers Jonathan Stark Scott Hanselman on Developer On Fire Scott Hanselman's Blog Post on "Dark Matter Developers" Joe Colantonio on Developer On Fire Uncle Bob Martin on Developer On Fire Ward Cunningham on Developer On Fire Michael Feathers on Developer On Fire No Silver Bullet - Frederick Brooks Udi Dahan On Best Practices Udi Dahan on Developer On Fire Paul's book recommendation: Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code - Martin Fowler Test Driven Development: By Example - Kent Beck Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software - Erich Gamma, Richard Helm, Ralph Johnson, John Vlissides Working Effectively with Legacy Code - Michael Feathers Paul's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Learn about the business you're in Listen to your customer Learn to communicate better

Guest: Gregory Brown @practicingdev Gregory Brown talks with Dave Rael about unorthodox approaches, views about business and life, long and short term optimism, and going beyond the practices that color our daily lives Gregory Brown is a business operations consultant, software developer, and technical writer. His new book "Programming Beyond Practices" was published by O'Reilly this fall, and it focuses on the non-code aspects of software development. Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and Gregory Brown - The nature of businesses and Gregory's perspective on value and business ethics - Advice for programmers focused primarily on software - The value or lack thereof of mission statements - Gregory's book - Programming Beyond Practices - Gregory's story and history of getting involved with Ruby, consulting, creating coding education resources, and mentoring - Gregory's motivations and different models of providing good things - Practicing Developer - a shift to something broader than just code - "pretend as if all the coding problems are easily solvable ... What's leftover then? ... What's the job of a software developer then?" - Gregory's story of failure - pathological altruism, unsustainability - Gregory's success story - shifting perspective and realizing the importance of an infrastructure including self-care - The things that have Gregory most excited - Gregory's book recommendations - Gregory's causes of pain and suffering - Gregory, the Buddhist practitioner, personal interpretation and growing personally - Gregory's top 3 tips for delivering more value - Keeping up with Gregory Resources: Programming Beyond Practices - Gregory Brown Gregory's Blog Practicing Ruby Prawn PDF "You cannot serve both God and money." - Matthew 6:24 "For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil." - 1 Timothy 6:10 "By their fruit you will recognize them." - Matthew 7:16 The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change - Stephen R. Covey James Edward Gray on Developer On Fire James Edward Gray Ruby Rogues Dave Thomas on Developer On Fire Melvin Conway #HumanizeTheCraft (Mel Conway) Eric Evans - What I've learned about DDD since the book Gregory's book recommendation: Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests - Steve Freeman Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software - Eric Evans The Principles of Product Development Flow: Second Generation Lean Product Development - Donald G. Reinertsen Gregory's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Active listening Demonstrate you understanding - Enhance your communication by finding way to test your understanding with feedback Have patience

Guest: Rebecca Wirfs-Brock @https://twitter.com/rebeccawb Rebecca Wirfs-Brock talks with Dave Rael about design, influence, patterns, personal skills, and having an influence on progress Rebecca is an object design pioneer who invented the set of design practices known as Responsibility-Driven Design (RDD). By accident she started the x-Driven Design meme (TDD, DDD, BDD…) and along the way authored two popular object design books that are still in print. In her work, Rebecca helps teams hone their design, architecture and thinking skills, manage and reduce technical debt, and adequately address architecture risks. In addition to coaching and personal mentoring, she conducts workshops on Responsibility-Driven Design, enterprise application design, agile design skills and thinking, being agile about system qualities, and Agile Architecture. Rebecca is program director of the Agile Alliance’s Experience Report Initiative and on The Hillside Group board. Recently she has written patterns about sustainable architecture, agile software quality, and adaptive systems architectures. She blogs at The Responsible Designer (http://wirfs-brock.com/blog/). If you are interested in writing about your experiences or sharing your wisdom in pattern form, contact Rebecca. She can help you turn your urge to write into the written word. Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and Rebecca Wirfs-Brock - Rebecca's running practice - How running is like writing software - Opportunity costs - How and why Rebecca became an author - Rebecca's introduction to object-oriented programming - Rebecca's marriage and Allen Wirfs-Brock - School, women in software, computer science as a discipline, and changes over time - How Rebecca got started in software and interested in design - Rebecca shares thoughts on the nature of design - Rebecca's story of failure - unrealistic expectations - Advice for making expectations more realistic - Cognitive psychology and understanding perception; the importance, virtue, and skills of selling ideas - Presentation of options in trying to sell ideas - Rebecca shares thoughts on the nature and value of patterns - The importance of design consistency - Rebecca's success story - Responsibility-Driven Design, contributing to a shared vocabulary, and influence - Rebecca's book recommendations - How Rebecca stays current with what she needs to know - Rebecca's top 3 tips for delivering more value - Keeping up with Rebecca Resources: Rebecca's Blog Responsibility-Driven Design Object Design: Roles, Responsibilities, and Collaborations - Rebecca Wirfs-Brock Designing Object-Oriented Software - Rebecca Wirfs-Brock Eric Elliott on Developer On Fire Allen Wirfs-Brock Carl Franklin on Developer On Fire "Fear is the path to the dark side" Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software - Erich Gamma, Richard Helm, Ralph Johnson, John Vlissides Goldilocks and the Three Bears Premature Optimization Uncle Bob Martin on Developer On Fire Uncle Bob Martin on The Single Responsibility Principle Martin Fowler on Anemic Domain Model Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software - Eric Evans Domain-Driven Design Distilled - Vaughn Vernon Rebecca's book recommendation: Thinking, Fast and Slow - Daniel Kahneman Implementing Domain-Driven Design - Vaughn Vernon Rebecca's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Make sure you understand what someone wants, not what you think they want Don't assume others have the same values as you

Guest: Aaron Olson @aarondolson Aaron Olson talks with Dave Rael about using automation to make life better, being an entrepreneur, pillars to hold up your life in tough times, and becoming a team player Aaron Olson is an Operations Manager who has been hanging out in the IT distribution industry with a passion for making all things better with software. He had been focused on the hardware side of the industry for 11 years until The Cloud showed up and completely changed how businesses consume IT resources. All was not lost as it became an opportunity for him to start a business which provides cloud-based storage & security services, put more of his programming skills to work and discover his love for entrepreneurship. When he's not working he enjoys spending time with his wife and 19 month old son and they are looking forward to the arrival of their 2nd child who is coming any day now. Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and Aaron Olson - Aaron's "pillars of life" - Aaron's experiences with health issues and tracking to become a "quantified self" - How Aaron learned to automate things and ultimately to write software - The things that "light Aaron up" - Aaron's story of getting into software development by taking initiative to make an inefficient operation work better via automation - Aaron's current life as an entrepreneur and the course of the business he's operating - Aaron's story of failure - a deficiency of collaborative software development effort - Aaron's success story - getting to a position of financial sustainability with a business self-built and knowing it all started with automation - How Aaron stays current with what he needs to know - Aaron's book recommendations - The things that have Aaron most excited - Aaron's causes of pain and suffering - Aaron's top 3 tips for delivering more value - Keep up with Aaron Resources: Quantified Self All by Myself! - Aliki Front-end Masters Sandi Metz on Developer On Fire Entreprogrammers Aaron's book recommendation: The Total Money Makeover: Classic Edition: A Proven Plan for Financial Fitness - Dave Ramsey EntreLeadership: 20 Years of Practical Business Wisdom from the Trenches - Dave Ramsey Aaron's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Have trackable goals Listen Don't be afraid to put yourself out there

Guest: Maggie Pint @maggiepint Maggie Pint talks with Dave Rael about diverse personalities, understanding the perspectives of others, taking action, and the uncelebrated amazing people around us Maggie works in the Open Source Programs office at Microsoft, where she helps people navigate Microsoft’s Open source ecosystem both by writing code to better automate open source processes, and by advocating Open Source Software within and outside the organization. In the past she has been a SQL Server DBA, a full stack .NET developer, and a project manager. In her non-Microsoft open source life, she is a maintainer of Moment.js, and a regular conference speaker advocating for open source involvement and better handling of date and time in programming. When she is not coding, Maggie enjoys spending time with her four-year-old son, drinking too much coffee, and showing and breeding Australian Shepherds. Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and Maggie Pint - Maggie's interest in dates and times - Maggie and moment.js - including a story of engaging, how she got involved with the project, and questioning the value of a feature - Maggie's attitude toward commitment - Becoming an open source maintainer - Getting a job at Microsoft - The open source office at Microsoft office - Motivations for involvement in open source - Advice for getting involved in open source software - Challenges of being a woman in open source software - Maggie's story of failure - approaching a team with hostile judgement - a shortage of understanding - Maggie's success story - taking action to do what she wanted, great and supportive management and team, and delivering on something new - How Maggie stays current with what she needs to know - Maggie's book recommendation - The things that have Maggie most excited - Maggie's causes of pain and suffering - The things about which Maggie likes to geek about - Maggie's top 3 tips for delivering more value - Keeping up with Maggie Resources: Maggie's Blog moment.js Matt Johnson on Developer On Fire Jeremy Clark on Developer On Fire Scott Nimrod on Developer On Fire Hamlet ( Folger Library Shakespeare) - William Shakespeare Sandi Metz on Developer On Fire Paul Czywczynski Doc Norton on Developer On Fire Scott Hanselman on Developer On Fire Uncle Bob Martin on Developer On Fire Node.js Is Bad Ass Rock Star Tech Maggie's book recommendation: Troubleshooting SQL Server - A Guide for the Accidental DBA - Jonathan Kehayias Maggie's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Have time for entry-level developers Read open source code Try to meet people where they are

Guest: Steve Smith @ardalis Steve Smith talks with Dave Rael about the intersections of entrepreneurship and software development, mentoring, education, and social rewards Steve Smith (@ardalis) is an entrepreneur and software developer with a passion for building quality software as effectively as possible. He provides mentoring and training workshops for teams with the desire to improve. Steve has been recognized as a Microsoft MVP for over 10 consecutive years, and is a frequent speaker at software developer conferences and events. He is the top contributor to the official documentation on ASP.NET Core and enjoys helping others write maintainable, testable applications using Microsoft’s developer tools. Connect with Steve at ardalis.com. Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and Steve Smith - The things that "light Steve up" - Feedback loops and automated testing - How Steve got started in software development - Steve the entrepreneur - Steve's involvement with ASP.NET Core and the nature of .NET Core and ASP.NET Core - Steve's story of failure - falling short on trying to fix an unsatisfying situation and coming to terms with things that can't be changed - Steve's success story - social rewards, turning technical scalability success to business success - Applying lessons of software to business - Different approaches to learning in software and business - Steve's book recommendations - Being and having a mentor - Parents as mentors - The things that have Steve most excited - Steve's sources of pain and suffering - Estimation in software vs other disciplines - Software Craftsmanship calendars - Steve's top 3 tips for delivering more value - Keeping up with Steve Resources: Steve's Blog DevIQ Steve's Pluralsight Author Page DevIQ Software Craftsmanship Calendars Microsoft Documentation ASP.NET Core Documentation Rachel Appel on Developer On Fire (also working on ASP.NET documentation at Microsoft) .NET Core Basketball Star Steve Smith of Michigan State (not Ohio State - oops) Donovan Brown on Developer On Fire (also working on ASP.NET documentation at Microsoft) Steve's SOLID Course on Pluralsight Doc Norton on Developer On Fire Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software - Eric Evans Hofstadter's Law Derick Bailey's Blog Post - SOLID Development Principles – In Motivational Pictures Derick Bailey on Developer On Fire Steve's book recommendation: Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship - Robert C. Martin Horse Sense: The Key to Success Is Finding a Horse to Ride - Al Ries Steve's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Deliver vertical slices of functionality rather than horizontal layers Make sure to build the right things and not just to build the thing right Trust must be given before it can be earned

Guest: Eric Lippert @ericlippert Eric Lippert talks with Dave Rael about leverage, building tools, impact, and solving interesting problems Eric Lippert designs programming languages and other tools at Facebook. Other notable work includes designing C# analyzers at Coverity, and developing the Visual Basic, VBScript, JScript and C# compilers at Microsoft. Eric is now a C# MVP. He is on Twitter at "@ericlippert" and writes a blog about programming language design and other fabulous adventures in coding at http://ericlippert.com. Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and Eric Lippert - Eric's career arc at Microsoft - Eric's history with many languages, environments, and tools at Microsoft - Eric's history and contribution to Stack Overflow - The new Microsoft - Eri'cs long tenure at Microsoft and departing to Facebook - Eric's life at Facebook and how it's different from and similar to Microsoft - Eric's impact - Relative strengths and weaknesses of different stacks and toolsets; perspectives of tool creators and tool users - How Eric got started in software - Eric's interest in languages - Eric's story of failure - futile programming effort - Eric's success story - multiplying the value of others by creating tools - delivering rearchitected C# compilers - How Eric stays current with what he needs to know - Eric's book recommendation - The things that have Eric most excited - Eric's top 3 tips for delivering more value - Keeping up with Eric Resources: Eric's Blog Eric on Stack Overflow Microsoft MVP Program Watcom Joel On Software - Joel Spolsky's Blog Coding Horror - Jeff Atwood's Blog Jeff Atwood's Poll on the name of the site that became Stack Overflow Joel Spolsky's Blog Post Announcing stackoverflow.com Raymond Chen Dam Buster Coverity OCaml Visio Sandi Metz on Developer On Fire The .NET Compiler Platform ("Roslyn") on GitHub .NET Language Design Notes Jon Skeet on Developer On Fire Eric's book recommendation: Essential C# 6.0 (5th Edition) (Addison-Wesley Microsoft Technology) - Mark Michaelis C# in Depth, 3rd Edition - Jon Skeet Purely Functional Data Structures (book) - Chris Okasaki Purely Functional Data Structures (PhD Thesis) - Chris Okasaki Eric's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Try to see abstractions Learn how to write Answer questions

Guest: @ Matthew Renze talks with Dave Rael about scientific approaches, educating and learning, science and software, experimenting, and fulfilling life choices Matthew Renze is an independent software and data science consultant with over 16 years of professional experience building large-scale data-driven desktop, server, and cloud-based applications. He is an author for Pluralsight, a Microsoft MVP, an ASPInsider, an international public speaker, and an open-source software contributor. His interests include data analytics, data visualization, and machine learning. Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and Matthew Renze - Matthew's thoughts on the meaning of agile - Matthew's draw to Data science and machine learning - All the things in which Matthew is involved - Matthew, learning, and education - Matthew's process for fleshing out ideas and turning them into different forms of education and sharing information - How Matthew stays current with what he needs to know - How Matthew got started in software - Matthew's story of failure - limiting scope of failures - overdoing the cumulative stress of long travel - Introversion and extroversion and the finite nature of personal energy - Matthew's success story - limiting the scope of failure, perspective on any situation - Criteria for qualifying something a success and assessing if something is a good fit for what to do with your life - Matthew's minimalism - Matthew's book recommendations - The things that have Matthew most excited - The things about which Matthew likes to geek out - Matthew's advice for developers for approaching mindfulness practices - Matthew's top 3 tips for delivering more value - Keeping up with Matthew Resources: Matthew's Blog Matthew's Pluralsight Author Page Tim Gifford Brandon Carlson Microsoft Hololens K. Scott Allen on Developer On Fire Troy Hunt on Developer On Fire Cory House on Developer On Fire Jon Mills on Developer On Fire Harvard Graphics Bruce Feiler: Agile Programming - For Your Family - TED "if you can't explain it simply you don't understand it well enough", "An alleged scientific discovery has no merit unless it can be explained to a barmaid" - Albert Einstein? Atari 400 Mike Mohrhauser Beacon (GIS Software) Ted Neward on Developer On Fire Jeremy Clark on Developer On Fire Richard Campbell on Developer On Fire Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don't - Jim Collins (mentioned directly and also appears to be the source of the flywheel metaphor) How to Increase Your Luck Surface Area - Jason Roberts Ari Meisel on Developer On Fire Andy Hunt on Developer On Fire Dave Thomas on Developer On Fire DevSci: Agile, DevOps, and Data Science - Matthew's Blog Post on Applying Data Feedback to DevOps RAGBRAI - Bicycle Ride Across Iowa Heart rate variability Galvanic Skin Response Matthew's book recommendation: The Pragmatic Programmer: From Journeyman to Master - Andrew Hunt Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less - Greg McKeown Matthew's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Understand what is valuable in the first place Identify the value stream and eliminate waste Maximize feedback

Guest: Gayle Laakman McDowell @gayle Gayle Laakman McDowell talks with Dave Rael about technical interviewing, business and entrepreneurship, humility, and impostor syndrome Gayle Laakmann McDowell is the founder/CEO of CareerCup.com and the author of Cracking the *interview books (Cracking the Coding Interview, Cracking the PM Interview, and Cracking the Tech Career). Her background is in software development, with a BSE/MSE in Computer Science from the University of Pennsylvania and an MBA from the Wharton School. She previously worked as a software engineer at Google, Microsoft, and Apple. In addition to running CareerCup and writing books, she consults with tech companies on their engineering hiring process and with startups to help them through acquisition interviews. Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and Gayle Laakman McDowell - How Gayle became and interviewer and ulitmatley an authority on technical interviews and interviewing - The nature of Gayle's life currently and the balance of the different types of activities - Advice for interviewing for technical jobs and what to seek from an interview - How Gayle started the website that became launched her business - Gayle the entrepreneur - The winding road to Gayle's current life and turning her website into a business - The switch in perception from side project to business - Human nature, learned behavior, and the reasons we tend to belittle our own successes - the perception of things we don't understand and mystical, difficult, and unapproachable - Advice for programmers to understand business better - The things that "light Gayle up" - Gayle's story of failure - slow to market because of minimizing her own accomplishments - Gayle's motivations for going to business school - The success of Gayle's first book - Gayle's thoughts on having "made it" - How Gayle stays current with what she needs to know - Gayle's book recommendations - The things that have Gayle most excited - The things about which Gayle likes to geek out - Gayle's top 3 tips for delivering more value - Keeping up with Gayle Resources: Gayle's Blog Gayle's Business: Career Cup Gayle on Quora Gayle on Facebook Cracking the Coding Interview: 189 Programming Questions and Solutions - Gayle Laakmann McDowell Cracking the Tech Career: Insider Advice on Landing a Job at Google, Microsoft, Apple, or any Top Tech Company - Gayle Laakman McDowell Cracking the PM Interview: How to Land a Product Manager Job in Technology - Gayle Laakmann McDowell The source of "Atoms are a drag" - What Would Google Do?: Reverse-Engineering the Fastest Growing Company in the History of the World - Jeff Jarvis Cricut Gayle's book recommendation: Stumbling on Happiness - Daniel Gilbert The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich - Timothy Ferriss Yes Man - Danny Wallace Gayle's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Say yes to things Take risks, don't trudge along, and be willing to stop and pull back Be less humble with your own successes - impostor syndrome is a sign you're normal, not that you lack something

Guest: Heather Downing @quorralyne Heather Downing talks with Dave Rael about being lit up, changing careers, human connections in software and elsewhere, and making an impact. Climbing the technology mountain and halfway up the side. Experience in .Net, mobile and basic iOT. Focusing on coding for humans and choosing the right tool for the job. Heather is a passionate coder and entrepreneur. She has experience working with Fortune 500 companies building enterprise level mobile and .Net applications. She spends her spare time at tech conferences supporting the growth of new developers of all genders, ages and backgrounds. When not coding, Heather spends her time as a competitive equestrian and learning the art of mounted archery. Chapters: - Dave introduces the show and Heather Downing - Heather the introvert and the need to relate to other people - Heather the career changer - the emotional journey of digging into technology and ultimately and becoming a developer - Heather's interest in and love for horses - Battling Imposter Syndrome, learning to accept credit for the fruits of your labor, the joy and benefits of awesome communities - Heather's advice for imposters - The great fortune of being a software developer - Human connection and the importance of communication, lessons in humanity from creating software - Heather's story of failure - keeping quiet instead of asking for help, leading to dire consequences - Heather's success story - achieving flexibility and versatility in learning new technology and skills - going from concept to reality in a startup weekend and spawning a software movement in a particular domain - Heather's book recommendation - The things that have Heather most excited - Heather's top 3 tips for delivering more value - Keeping up with Heather Resources: Heather's Blog Jeremy Clark on Developer On Fire Brave (2012 film) Mounted archery Yabusame Mongol Mounted Archers Must Listen History Podcast Series on the Mongols - Hardcore History - Wrath of the Khans - Dan Carlin (no longer free) Jon Mills on Developer On Fire Impostor Syndrome Lee Brandt on Developer On Fire Scott Hanselman on Being An Imposter The Imposter's Handbook - Rob Conery Dressage The Pragmatic Programmer: From Journeyman to Master - Andrew Hunt Matthew Renze Tesla Solar Roof Solar Roadways HyperDev Daniel Moore on Developer On Fire Heather at PairieCode() Speaking on Imposter Syndrome Heather's book recommendation: The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles - Steven Pressfield Heather's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Take inventory of your skill set and assess where you are in relation to what you need to do Don't be shy about asking for help Find the joy in what you're building