Kopec Explains Software

Product managers manage the teams that build software. In this episode we interview David Short, whose been a product manager for software teams at multiple companies. He tells us what it’s like to be a product manager, how he works together with software developers, and David gives some advice for aspiring product managers. Show Links David Short on Twitter Products and Payments (David's blog) Bu...

Since the invention of the modern computer, humans have been trying to write chess playing programs. In this episode, we trace the history of computer chess, and explain how a chess program works. We discuss why developing a world champion computer chess AI was considered a great achievement. And we finish with how computer chess continues to evolve, and how it’s evolving human chess. Follow us on...

Artificial Intelligence is enabling exciting new computing applications, but many people don’t really understand what it is. In this episode we give AI a broad definition, explain the difference between strong AI and weak AI, and delve into some of the many sub-disciplines that fall under its umbrella. We provide a general sense of machine learning by touching on a few of its approaches including...

The open source movement has completely changed the software industry. In this episode we explain what it means for software to be open source. We dive into the origins of the movement, its split from the free software movement, and some of its key players. We explain the four freedoms, the legal model behind open source licenses, and some of the ethics. Most importantly, we explain the benefits o...

Programming languages are what we use to communicate ideas in computing. Software is written in a programming language and most people have a vague sense of what a programming language looks like. In this episode we explain a programming language’s purpose and we categorize programming languages into various paradigms. We discuss some of the characteristics that make one programming language disti...

Emulators allow software designed for one computing system to run on another. They act as a kind of translation layer, simulating the hardware of the emulated system in software. Common applications include running software designed for video game systems on personal computers, and running business applications designed for a computing platform that the user doesn’t own. We discuss what emulators...

We discuss what it takes to make a mobile app. What are the primary different kinds of jobs that people who work on apps have? What are the phases of the development cycle to go from idea to release? How hard is it to make an app? We left our talking about one role: product managers/project managers who may facilitate the whole process and we’ll cover them in a future episode. Follow us on Twitter...

Information on the Web is always at our fingertips thanks to search engines. But, what makes them tick? In this episode we go over crawling, indexing, and ranking, the three phases a web page must go through to end up in your search results. We briefly discuss the PageRank algorithm and differences between various search engines. We conclude by discussing privacy issues. Theme “Place on Fire” Copy...

Computers are not just great for calculating, they’re also great for storing, manipulating, and viewing text. In fact, the majority of the work we do on a computer is “text work.” But, how does a computer actually store text? How is text represented in software? In this episode we dive into the world of character encodings, the way that software represents text. Theme “Place on Fire” Copyright 201...

What are the technologies that underly the Web? We discuss Web Browsers and Web Servers. We touch on: the protocols they use to communicate (HTTP and HTTPS), the languages they use to render web pages (HTML, CSS, JavaScript), and server-side technologies like databases and server-side programming languages. Theme “Place on Fire” Copyright 2019 Creo , [CC BY 4.0] ( https://creativecommons.org/licen...

The Internet is not a single technology—it’s a combination of networking technologies including protocols, physical devices, and software. In this episode we delve into its many layers and try to provide an intuitive understanding about how they all fit together. We cover topics like routing, packets, application protocols, and encryption. Theme “Place on Fire” Copyright 2019 Creo , [CC BY 4.0] (...

iOS vs. Android In this episode we discuss the similarities and differences between iOS and Android. We delve into their history, business models, developer ecosystems, and user experiences. Does it really matter if you use iOS or Android? Listen to this episode and find out. David Kopec on Twitter Theme “Place on Fire”, Copyright 2019 Creo , CC BY 4.0 Find out more at http://kopec.live

What is a Byte? What is a Byte? In this episode we go down to the fundamentals and explain how data is represented in a computer. We discuss what a bit is, both at the hardware level and the software level. Then we discuss other terms like kilobyte, megabyte, gigabyte, and terabyte. We give various examples of real world files and their storage needs. Finally, we talk about the evolution of microp...

What is an Operating System? This week we discuss the most essential layer of a computer’s software, the operating system. We describe what an operating system is. We denote the differences between popular operating systems. The varying operating system business models are described. And we talk about why operating systems are important. David Kopec on Twitter Theme “Place on Fire”, Copyright 2019...

What is Software? We define software. What is software? How is it different than hardware? What is the language of software? What are the different kinds of software? Who makes software? How do they make it? David Kopec on Twitter Theme “Place on Fire”, Copyright 2019 Creo , CC BY 4.0 Find out more at http://kopec.live