Two Voice Devs

In this episode, Allen Firstenberg and Sam Witteveen dive into one of the newest and most discussed concepts in the developer community: the "Agent Harness." What exactly is a harness, and how does it transform a simple, one-shot AI model into a truly capable, autonomous agent? Sam and Allen demystify this new paradigm, tracing its evolution from early frameworks like LangChain and LangG...

Roll tape and prompt! In this episode of Two Voice Devs, Allen and Mark explore how Google’s new advanced prompting guidelines turn developers into voice directors for Gemini Text-to-Speech. Instead of coding rigid SSML tags, you can now establish a scene, write stage directions, and give "director's notes" to shape a base voice's gender, accent, style, and pacing. Allen showcase...

After months of conferences and busy schedules, Mark Tucker and Allen Firstenberg return to discuss Microsoft’s surprising Build conference announcement: Project Solara. Moving from the legacy voice-first consumer world of Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant, Microsoft is pioneering a secure, business-focused "Agent-first" platform. In this episode, we unpack Microsoft's two new concep...

Allen and Mike record live from Google I/O in the Builders podcast space. They discuss their impressions of this year's conference, the evolution of I/O over the years, and the big announcements from the keynote. Key topics include Gemini's "any output from any input" vision, how the new NanoBanana and Omni models are different than Imagen and Veo, the state of Android XR develop...

Allen and Noble are live from Google I/O! This episode breaks down the biggest keynote news: agentic coding in Search, the power of Generative UI, and the future of "intelligent eyewear." They share what these changes mean for the venerable Google Search, what works (and what doesn't) with the new Google Glass, and how Android XR fits into the picture. From wearable AI to interactive...

Allen and Alice are on the ground at Google Cloud Next, breaking down the biggest shifts in the AI landscape. This episode explores the transition from focusing on models to building agents with the launch of the Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform. They discuss the new TPU v8 hardware, the power of the Model Context Protocol (MCP) for Workspace integration, and how tools like Workspace Studio are ma...

In part two of this insightful conversation, Allen and Sam Witteveen dive deep into the rapidly expanding world of AI models beyond the "big three." They explore the impact of open-weight and Chinese models like DeepSeek, Mistral, and Qwen, discussing their impressive efficiency and coding capabilities. The conversation shifts to the rise of agentic workflows and how tools like Claude Co...

In Part 1 of a two-part series, guest host Sam Witteveen joins Allen to catch up and dive deep into the rapidly evolving world of AI models. Sam shares his fascinating journey from being a successful pop songwriter to becoming a Machine Learning Google Developer Expert (GDE) and running the massive Machine Learning Singapore meetup. The conversation shifts to the latest AI developments, exploring...

Allen has been busy! This week, he unveils the new `@langchain/google` package for LangChain JS. This major update consolidates five previous libraries into a single, standardized, and powerful tool for developers working with Gemini and Vertex AI. Allen walks Mark through the motivation behind the change, the focus on backward compatibility, and the exciting new features like simplified multimoda...

Ever wonder how "Two Voice Devs" goes from a raw recording to a finished episode? In this episode, Allen Firstenberg takes Mark Tucker on a deep dive into his production workflow. They discuss how Descript’s text-based editing revolutionized their process, how Allen uses a custom Gemini CLI agent to automate show notes and descriptions, and the technical (and ethical!) journey of creatin...

Mark and Allen dive into the emerging world of Agent Skills, an open standard for extending the capabilities of AI coding assistants like GitHub Copilot, Claude Code, and Gemini CLI. They explore how these skills work, how they compare to the Model Context Protocol (MCP), and walk through creating and installing a custom skill using the `skills` CLI. They also discuss the skills.sh website by Verc...

Allen and Mike discuss Google's new "Personal Intelligence" feature for Gemini. They explore how it connects to your personal data like Photos, Gmail, and Docs to provide context-aware answers. The conversation covers real-world use cases, privacy concerns regarding training data, and the importance of transparency and granular control in AI systems. They also touch on the "blac...

Allen Firstenberg welcomes back guest host Mike Wolfson, an Android Google Developer Expert, to discuss the shifting landscape of User Experience (UX) in the age of Artificial Intelligence. As we move toward autonomous agents and multimodal interactions—incorporating voice, haptics, and environmental data—the reliance on traditional screens and touch interfaces is set to diminish. Mike shares insi...

In this episode, Mark introduces Allen to Parlant, an open-source framework for building agentic AI. They explore how Parlant differs from other frameworks like LangChain and LangGraph by using concepts like "journeys" for flexible conversation flows and "guidelines" for conditional rule application. Mark walks through the key features, including the ability to define glossarie...

Happy New Year! Allen and Mark kick off 2026 by looking back at the whirlwind of AI developments in 2025. From the explosion of agentic frameworks like LangGraph, Google's Agent Development Kit, and the Microsoft Agent Framework to the emergence of protocols like MCP and A2A, it was a year of rapid evolution. They discuss the rise of "vibe coding," the state of voice assistants like...

Get ready for the ULTIMATE SHOWDOWN of holiday cheer and artificial intelligence! In this SPECIAL HOLIDAY EPISODE, Mark and Allen aren't just exchanging pleasantries—they're exchanging MIND-BENDING REBUS PUZZLES generated by some AI models themselves! It's a battle of wits, a clash of code, and a festive face-off as Microsoft Copilot takes on Google's Gemini (and the famous "Nano Banana Pro") to s...

Mark Tucker explores Microsoft Azure's "Voice Live" feature within the newly rebranded Microsoft Foundry. He demonstrates how to take a standard text-based AI agent—in this case, one that talks like a pirate—and instantly give it a voice using WebSockets to bridge speech-to-text and text-to-speech. Mark walks through the differences between the "Old" Foundry (V1) and the "New" Foundry (V2), shows...

Allen and Mark discuss the architecture of Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers, using Allen's experience with "Vodo Drive" as a case study. They dive into critical considerations for building effective agents, focusing on security, managing API complexity, and enforcing business logic. The conversation explores how to move beyond simple REST API wrappers to create high-level, contex...

In this episode of Two Voice Devs, Mark Tucker and Allen Firstenberg dive into the world of GitHub Copilot. Mark shares his recent experience preparing for the GitHub Copilot (GH-300) certification and walks us through the various features and modes of the tool within Visual Studio Code. They discuss the differences between "Ask," "Edit," and "Agent" modes, how Copilo...

Mark Tucker and Allen Firstenberg dive into Microsoft Copilot Studio, a low-code tool for creating conversational agents with a focus on enterprise integrations. Mark demonstrates how to build a file upload agent that summarizes invoices using a Large Language Model (LLM). They explore the studio's interface, including topics, triggers, and the designer canvas, while comparing it to familiar t...

Allen and Mark return after a hiatus for their annual Thanksgiving episode. They reflect on a busy year, expressing deep gratitude for the community's concern and support. The conversation explores the vital importance of human connection in a tech-centric world, the impact of mentorship, and finding balance between passion projects and life outside of work. [00:00:00] Welcome back & addre...

Join Allen Firstenberg and Noble Ackerson in a deep dive into the evolving world of AI agent protocols. In this episode of Two Voice Devs, they unpack the Agent-to-Agent (A2A) protocol, comparing it with the Model Context Protocol (MCP). They explore the fundamental differences, from A2A's conversational, stateful nature to MCP's function-call-like structure. The discussion also touches on...

Allen and Mark are back to discuss AI agent frameworks again. This time, Allen compares Google's Agent Development Kit (ADK) with LangChainJS and LangGraphJS. He walks through building a simple agent in both frameworks, highlighting the differences in their approaches, from configuration by convention in ADK to the explicit configuration in LangGraph. They also explore the web-based testing en...

In this episode of Two Voice Devs, Mark and Allen dive into the new experimental Text-to-Speech (TTS) model in Google's Gemini 2.5. They explore its capabilities, from single-speaker to multi-speaker audio generation, and discuss how it's a significant leap from the old days of SSML. They also touch on how this new technology can be integrated with LangChainJS to create more dynamic and na...

Join Allen and Mark as they take a first look at the newly released GPT-5 from OpenAI. They dive into the details of what's new, what's changed, and what's missing, frequently comparing it to other models like Google's Gemini. From the new mini and nano models to the pricing wars with competitors, they cover the landscape of the latest LLM offerings. They also discuss the new featu...