The Stack Overflow podcast is a weekly conversation about working in software development, learning to code, and the art and culture of computer programming. Hosted by Paul Ford and Ben Popper, the series features questions from our community, interviews with fascinating guests, and hot takes on what’s happening in tech. Founded in 2008, Stack Overflow is empowering the world to develop technology through collective knowledge. It’s best known for being the largest, most trusted online community for developers and technologists. More than 100 million people come to Stack Overflow every month to ask questions, help solve coding problems, and develop new skills.
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Between hyper-focus and burnout: Developing with ADHD
Read Eira’s two-part series about developers with ADHD here and here.Chris recommends that devs with ADHD employ a “second brain” to help them track and remember information. Read Eira’s article on what second brains reveal about how we work.A few years back Chris joined us to talk about the most lightweight web “framework” around: VanillaJS. Listen to the episode.Chris offers classes and workshops for front-end developers, plus daily advice for developers with ADHD.Connect with Chris through his website or social media.
Reshaping the future of API platforms
Kong is a cloud-native API gateway. Find them on GitHub.We last spoke with Marco in 2023. infConnect with Marco on LinkedIn.Congrats to Famous Question badge winner mjbradford7 on How to re-render one component from another in React.
The reverse mullett model of software engineering
If you’ve been laid off or you’re just sweating the possibility, here’s what to do. Check out the results of our last job market survey. Connect with Patrick on LinkedIn.Shoutout to stevenkucera, who earned a Stellar Question badge with How do I create a global, mutable singleton?.
Net neutrality is in; TikTok and noncompetes are out
In a narrow vote, the US Federal Trade Commission banned almost all noncompete agreements, a staple of the tech industry for years.Learn how a 2017 tax law is haunting startups in 2024.Finnish hacker Aleksanteri Kivimäki exposed tens of thousands of confidential psychiatric records and tried to extort payment directly from the affected patients. Read more about it here or here. It happened: President Biden signed the TikTok “ban,” setting a deadline for the platform’s parent company, China-based ByteDance, to divest the app within a year. And TikTok faces yet more hurdles ahead.Net neutrality is back, baby. Here’s what that means.
Supporting the world’s most-used database engine through 2050
SQLite is the most used database engine in the world. Stop by the forum or explore the docs.Devs have pledged to support SQLite through the year 2050. The developer with a team of three, all of them himself at different points in time, was Tarn Adams of Dwarf Fortress fame. On Stack Overflow, 1.2 million people have found the answer to How can I list the tables in a SQLite database file that was opened with ATTACH?.
Is GenAI the next dot-com bubble?
Meta’s open-source Llama 3 model puts Meta’s AI assistant head-to-head with ChatGPT.Stability AI laid off 10% of its workforce, the first major AI foundation model to reduce its workforce since the advent of generative AI.Is the dot-com bubble a cautionary tale for AI enthusiasts? Listen to the episode of Marketplace from NPR.Do LLMs support Wittgenstein’s position that “meaning is use”? That depends whether you’re talking pre or post Tractatus, of course.TikTok wouldn’t lie to you: you really can make friends with your local crows. Eira’s proven method for befriending crows: Feed them dry cat food on a consistent schedule, so they learn you’re reliable, and watch them eat, so they grok that you are feeding them intentionally.Stack Overflow user Arman Ordookhani received a well-deserved Lifeboat badge for telling nearly 30,000 people How to free memory in go.
Why configuration is so complicated
Why can’t configuration be made simple? Apple is making it easier for users to repair their iPhones with used parts.Texas is swapping human graders for AI.Automattic (owner of WordPress) is acquiring Beeper for $125M.Silicon Valley or not, San Francisco’s train system still uses floppy disks. But don’t worry, an upgrade is coming—in 2030.Shoutout to Bite code, who earned a Stellar Question badge with How do I change the URI (URL) for a remote Git repository?.
If everyone is building AI, why aren't more projects in production?
Get started with MongoDB Atlas on Google Cloud today. Read more from the MongoDB DevRel team at the MongoDB Developer Center.Learn more about Google’s Gemini models. Shout out to thitemple for their Lifeboat-worthy answer to In TypeScript, how do I declare a function that returns a string type array?.
How do you evaluate an LLM? Try an LLM.
Connect with Michael on LinkedIn. Shoutout to user1083266, who earned a Stellar Question badge with How to store image in SQLite database.
Diverting more backdoor disasters
ICYMI: A backdoor in XZ, a popular open-source compression utility, highlights the risks of relying on open-source software maintained by small teams. Read more about the cyberattack here.Apple’s new LLM, Ferret, could help Siri understand the user interfaces of mobile displays, potentially expanding the capabilities of Apple’s digital assistant. Shoutout to Stack Overflow user cheese1756, who earned a Great Question badge by asking How do I ensure that whitespace is preserved in Markdown?.
Climbing the GenAI decision tree
Learn more about the potential of AI inference with OpenVINO Notebooks.Check out the previous podcast with Intel, where we talk with Raymond Lo about how hardware and software work together with AI.Connect with Ria on LinkedIn or GitHub. Congrats to Lifeboat badge winner Kevin, who showed what they know about TypeError; Must use key word argument or key function in Python 3.x.
Want to be a great software engineer? Don’t be a jerk.
A developer discovered a backdoor in XZ, a popular open-source compression utility. Read more about the cyberattack here.A Microsoft technical report pinpoints 54 attributes of great software engineers.A new report from The Economist lays out how AI is changing drug development.Are you sick of hearing about AI? What topics or technologies would you rather hear us talk about? Email us at podcast@stackoverflow.com or DM Ben here.
What a year building AI has taught Stack Overflow
You can find Jessica on LinkedIn.We've published several posts, including this most recent one, about our attempt to shape an ethical approach to combining our community of knowledge and today's AI systems.Check out this blog post that details some of the work we did to build our data platform. Congrats to macfij on your lifeboat badge for answering the question: How can I do a CTRL + A and a CTRL + C?
Are long context windows the end of RAG?
DBRX, an open, general-purpose LLM created by Databricks, reportedly outperforms GPT-3.5 and is competitive with Gemini 1.0 Pro.Recent research found that large, complex LLMs use a simple mechanism to retrieve stored knowledge in response to a user prompt. These mechanisms can help researchers reveal what the model knows and potentially even correct false information it has stored.FTX co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried, whose downfall began in late 2022, was sentenced last week to 25 years in prison for conspiracy and fraud. Find Michael on LinkedIn.Find Cassidy on her website.Stack Overflow user Bucket received a well-deserved Lifeboat badge for rescuing How to calculate decimal(x, y) max value in SQL Server from an ocean of ignorance.Chapters (please note that these timestamps may not be exact): 00:00 Introduction and White Paper Discussion02:01 Long Context Windows and Retrieval Augmented Generation05:56 Models' Ability to Recall Relevant Information07:18 Models' Creativity and Thinking Outside the Box09:41 Advantages and Limitations of Models' Knowledge15:09 Databricks' Open Language Model22:25 Sam Bankman-Fried’s Sentence and the Effects on Crypto/Blockchain31:28 Closing Remarks and Lifeboat Badge
Will antitrust suits benefit developers?
Small nations like Anguilla (.ai) and Tuvalu (.tv) are benefiting from their coveted domain names.The US government is suing Apple for violation of antitrust laws, which could have a huge impact on devs, end users, and the whole ecosystem. Reddit went public last week despite not being profitable since its launch in 2005.How can you give feedback on a poorly reviewed PR? The Software Engineering Stack Exchange has ideas.The four day work week is probably not the solution to our work-life balance problems.AI-powered software development tools like Devon show promise, but their impact on code quality and maintainability remains an open question.Shoutout to Robert, who earned a Lifeboat badge by explaining Square brackets in CSS.Chapters00:00 Introduction00:31 The Impact of Dot AI Domain Space01:07 Antitrust Cases Against Apple04:01 Vendor Lock-in and Apple's Ecosystem05:08 Issues with Infotainment Systems and Apple Play06:29 The Benefits and Challenges of a Four-Day Work Week08:03 Providing Feedback on a Badly Reviewed PR10:00 The Importance of Clear Expectations in Code Reviews11:40 The Potential of AI Tools in Development14:01 Reddit Going Public and the Future of Tech Companies15:29 AI Tool Devon and the Challenges of Operationalizing AI Projects21:22 Shoutout and Closing Remarks