Picture Me Coding

Mike's out this week so Erik went into his backyard and talked about famous Naturalists while birds chirped in the background. It's short and unexpected!  Send us Fan Mail

It’s a very old software engineering question: should we build the thing or buy the thing? Fred Brooks says "you should always buy." This may even be an existential question : my role is to build things , not to buy them, right? Why would I ever buy anything?  According to Mike, learning to answer the "Build or Buy" is an essential part of becoming a software engineer, so we&ap...

In which Mike and Erik try to understand what "edge computing" means and whether it's meaningful or marketing speak. The topic comes up because Mike decides to run an LLM on his laptop and it turns out that when he's doing this he's participating in  edge computing ! For musict his week Erik is listening to the Baroness album Stone  while Mike has been into Brittany Howard...

This week Mike and Erik dig into their bookshelves to find and discuss their favorite technical books. As per usual, Mike references a bunch of stuff Erik has never heard of but one new thing this week is that Erik tries hard not to piss off Radiohead fans. Books Mentioned Unix Network Programming , W. Richard Stevens Software Architecture in Practice , Bass, Clements, Kazman Fundamentals of Inter...

This week Mike and Erik conclude their discussion on complexity with a review of the 2006 fan-favorite paper "Out of the Tar Pit." Send us Fan Mail

As programmers, we want to control complexity and simplify our software, but these things are often hard for us to define. We know them when we see them! This week, Mike and Erik talk about what it means to say that software is "complex" and along the way they'll offer three definitions of complexity, so the next time you're at work and commenting on pull requests and telling s...

This week Mike and Erik chat about deploying software and try to understand how it used to be and characterize what it's mostly like now. What are the best ways to deploy we've seen in our careers and what mistakes can we avoid. As is typical, there is much complaining also. For music this week Mike mentioned Melusine by Cecile Mclorin Salvant, where are we?   by Joshua Redman and Gabrie...

Mike and Erik share debugging stories... Send us Fan Mail

In this last recording for 2023, Mike and Erik talk about embarrassing things they've done at work over the years. These are mistakes, errors, screwups and mishaps and, yes, there will be swearing . As mentioned on this episode, we have an email now, so please get in touch with us! Send us your feedback, tips, or ruminations on the show here: podcast@picturemecoding.com . Also, check out the...

In this episode Mike and Erik talk to Chris Staszak who works for a startup investor in San Diego. Chris teaches the pair of hosts how to pitch startups to investors and also raises some of the common pitfalls in approaching funders and running a startup.  In order to test their newfound skills, Erik pitches an AI-powered coffee machine while Mike pitches a solution to the housing crisis involving...

This week on the show, Mike and Erik discuss the work of Barbara Liskov. Their discussion includes a tour through types, concurrency, and distributed systems. Liskov has had an incredible career spanning 6 decades and contributed ideas that are foundational to work we do as day-to-day software developers. Hope they're up to this task! References Abstract Types “ Programming with abstract data...

Today on the show we welcome Scott Aker who regales us with a tale of a seedy group of hackers breaking into cloud compute services in order to steal compute power for their own nefarious aims.  Scott started writing software in the Bay Area in the '80s and moved on to become an engineering manager overseeing operations and infrastructure, areas of activity we would today probably call "...

This week Erik asks Mike what living person he'd want to meet and then volunteers a person he would _not_ want to meet, Ludwig Wittgenstein. Then Erik promises Mike that if they spend an hour talking about language philosophy, he'll never bring it up again, which Mike openly doubts . Finally, the pair try to relate this unexpected conversation to software. This week Mike was listening to...

On this episode, Mike and Erik talk Kubernetes requests and limits as well as the Linux CPU scheduler. Erik complains impotently and Mike sagely breaks down the problem and then Erik complains some more. There is even some light ranting. Oh, also, Mike talks a lot about Bach and Erik talks about Aesop Rock 's new record Integrated Tech Solutions , where he raps that "we cannot be trusted...

This week on the 35th anniversary of the infamous Morris Worm, Mike and Erik look back at this sensational true crime story. Computers will be disconnected from the internet and wiped clean! Network switches may be rigged to explode ! The Morris Worm was the first widespread hack that propagated itself independently from user actions and it paved the way for the botnets of today. Music we were lis...

Have you ever wished you could trade billions of dollars in stocks and bonds from an Excel spreadsheet? Do you get impatient when your code takes longer than one microsecond to run? If so, then the exciting world of High Frequency Trading may be for you! In this episode, special guest Bob Farzin, who worked  in the field for a decade, takes us on a metaphorical flume ride into the intense and biza...

This week Mike and Erik talked about Leslie Lamport's work. Lamport has been called "the father of distributed systems" and we cover Lamport clocks, Paxos, TLA+ and others of his ideas. For music, Erik has been listening to Again   by Oneohtrix Point Never while Mike has been stuck on  8-Track by Ashley Bathgate . References Lamport’s Personal Site (with links to all of his papers)...

You can probably learn a lot about a person by asking what they've changed their minds about. In a long career as a software engineer, you will have a lot of opportunities to change your mind. This week Mike talks about technologies he changed his mind about and Erik shares a few examples of his own. For music this week Mike is listening to Javelin , the new Sufjan Stevens album, while Erik i...

Lithium mining! Water policy! Housing! Software development! What do these things have to do with each other? Let’s find out in this week’s episode, an interview with Frank Holland , a political and governmental affairs strategist. This week is our first interview with an expert and in addition to random questions about lithium mining we'll also ask Frank our favorite question for an expert:...

Mike and Erik talk about  second systems and weigh whether we can ever even avoid the things in the first place. Acronyms loom large in this conversation, both IRS and AWS come up.  Here are some links to things that we talked about in the show : Joel (not Jeff!) Spolsky post: https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-never-do-part-i/ IRS IMF: https://federalnewsnetwork.com/tom-t...

Mike and Erik talk about super powers and then discuss technologies that were around in previous decades which seemed like they were going to be a big deal and then faded away. Mike also talks about HELLMODE by Jeff Rosenstock while Erik raves about Motomami by Rosalia. Send us Fan Mail

Mike and Erik talk betamax and ask the question: why do some technologies get popular? Your podcast hosts are on the case! Mike tells the story of going to the "Professional Developer Conference" and Erik asks hard-hitting questions about what he ate there. Music for this week: Giant Sand 's Center of the Universe and Karol G 's Mañana Será Bonito (Bichota Season) . Send us Fan...

This week Mike and Erik play a game called "quotes tennis" where they try to trip each other up with quotes from the field that the other struggles to disagree with. It's a battle of wits: do you know your opponent well enough to challenge them? Music  discussed includes:  “Bummer Year”  by the band Good Looks  and " Where Are All the Nice Girls?" by Any Trouble. Send us F...

Mike and Erik discuss Hillel Wayne's 3-part blog piece titled “ Are We Really Engineers ?” Erik tries to convince Mike that we can throw caution to the wind and design software based on vibes alone. Send us Fan Mail

Mike and Erik talk about the worst interview questions you can ask software engineers and then ponder the interview process: why's it so terrible interviewing for software positions? They'll try to figure out how bad it can get. Send us Fan Mail