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BookBytes

A book club for developers.

BookBytes is a book club podcast for developers. Each episode the hosts discuss part of a book they've been reading. And they also chat with authors about their books. The books are about development, design, ethics, history, and soft skills. Sometimes there are tangents (also known as footnotes).

Hosts

Adam Garrett-Harris

Jason Staten

Megan Duclos

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Latest Episodes

9/19/2022BookBytes

46: A Mind at Play

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Adam and Jason finally learn about the guy who invented the Information Age and how the transmission of data over long distances is even possible.

2/28/2022BookBytes

45: Weapons of Math Destruction

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Adam and Jason learn about how algorithms affect people in the everyday lives in very destructive ways as well as some ways to disarm them and how to use models for good.

11/15/2021BookBytes

44: Soonish

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Adam really wants cheap access to space, Jason really wants augmented reality, and they talk about other things that may or may not happen in the future.

6/21/2021BookBytes

43: Pico-8 Zine

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Jason and Adam learn about making games for a fantasy console with a lot of constraints.

3/21/2021BookBytes

42: So You Want to Talk About Race

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Adam, Jason, and Rizel talk about race and how to talk about race. They cover issues like privilege, intersectionality, police brutality, and microaggressions.

11/30/2020BookBytes

41: Seven Languages in Seven Weeks - Haskell

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Jason has dipped in and out of Haskell over the years, Adam did very little of the problems, and Jason teaches Adam a lot about functional programming.

11/9/2020BookBytes

38: Seven Languages in Seven Weeks - Scala

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Adam loves how it supports functional and object-oriented programming, Jason said it would take a long time to really wrap his head around it, and Adam had a hard time installing and running it.

11/2/2020BookBytes

37: Seven Languages in Seven Weeks - Prolog

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Adam remembered using Prolog in college, Jason felt like he had no what he was doing, Adam thought it was fun and mind bending, and Jason felt like writing a Sudoku solver was like having cheat mode on.

10/26/2020BookBytes

36: Seven Languages in Seven Weeks - Io

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Adam thought Io is a weird language, it changed Jason's perspective, and Adam thought the interview with the creator was insightful.

10/6/2020BookBytes

35: Seven Languages in Seven Weeks - Ruby

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Adam and Jason talk about the benefits of learning new languages, they talk through their experience with Ruby, and discuss their solutions to the challenges in the book.

8/24/2020BookBytes

34: Life in Code

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Adam tells the story of how Ellen got into programming, Jason describes the barriers of the current online courses, Megan talks about the sexism Ellen experienced, and they talk about Y2K and ponder the difference between life and AI.

8/10/2020BookBytes

33: You Look Like a Thing and I Love You

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Adam, Jason, and Megan learn about some of the amazing things AI can do, laugh at the dumb stuff it does sometimes, are a bit disappointed by its limitations, and come out more informed about what to realistically expect going forward.

5/26/2020BookBytes

32: Remote

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Jason and Adam talk about working remotely amid a global pandemic. Adam got a standing desk, they agree that is better when everyone is remote, and they talk about having a good setup and routines.

2/25/2020BookBytes

31: Radical Candor - Part 2

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Jason brings up the differences between Apple and Google, Jen talks about taking breaks, and they discuss gender politics.

2/3/2020BookBytes

30: Radical Candor - Part 1

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Adam talks about an awful boss he had, Jen talks about 2 wolves, they talk about rockstars vs superstars, and the radical candor framework.

12/9/2019BookBytes

29: Getting Things Done

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Jason and Jen interview Adam about Getting Things Done, Jen and Adam talk about bullet journaling, and Jen relates it all to imposter syndrome.

9/2/2019BookBytes

28: Cracking the Coding Interview

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Adam talks about how he has used the book to prepare for interviews, Safia talks about the Microsoft interview process, Jason tells a story about arguing in an interview, and they each talk about a problem they solved.

7/22/2019BookBytes

27: Measure What Matters

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Jason read Measure What Matters, and Adam and Safia have a bunch of questions about what OKRs are and how they work.

6/18/2019BookBytes

26: Ready Player One

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Jason talks about how close we are to the technology in the book, Safia interviews the parents about screen time with kids, and they talk about 80's references and old video games.

6/4/2019BookBytes

25: Code Girls: Part 3

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

They discuss how to pronounce The Bombe, Adam talks about Conway's Law, and Safia compares sexism in the workplace to warfare.

5/13/2019BookBytes

24: Code Girls: Part 2

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Safia has a new job, they talk about how much they know or don't know about WWII, Safia talks about the disposability of the women, and they talk about women's pockets and things that remind them of Computer Science.

4/18/2019BookBytes

23: Code Girls: Part I

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Safia compares the recruiting efforts to modern day, Jason looks at good qualities for cracking codes and did some research on Shakespeare authorship, Jen talks about the challenges women go through, and they talk about strategies for cracking codes.

3/27/2019BookBytes

22: Code Girls: Introduction

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Adam asks what they think about the title of the book, Safia is struck by the fact that women were disqualified because of ethnicity, Jen mentions how women's photos became a source of commentary, and Safia talks about what people value in men vs women.

2/11/2019BookBytes

20: Ara the Star Engineer

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Everyone geeks out over this children's picture book, Jason and Jen read it to their daughters, Adam and Safia overthink it a little bit, and they give advice on reading it to a child.

11/21/2018BookBytes

17: The Imposter's Handbook: Functional Programming and Databases

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Safia talks about the four themes of functional programming, Jason tells us the difference between currying and partial application, Jason finds out that third normal form is not the most normal form. And Adam found out that BASE is the opposite of ACID.

5/28/2018BookBytes

8: Technically Wrong: Part 2

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

We get into a lively discussion about sexism and racism in the workplace and the interview process, and Safia puts Adam and Jason in the hot seat.

5/14/2018BookBytes

7: Technically Wrong: Part 1

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

Many apps and websites are sexist, racist, or marginalize people. In this episode, we talk about a lot of examples from the book about these apps.

4/30/2018BookBytes

6: Technically Wrong Intro

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

We get some updates from Safia and talk about our expectations for the book.

4/23/2018BookBytes

5: Apprenticeship Patterns: Author - Dave Hoover

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

We talked with one of the authors of Apprenticeship Patterns about the process of writing the book, reading, learning, career paths, and changes he would make to the book.

4/9/2018BookBytes

4: Apprenticeship Patterns Ch 5-7

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

We talked about drinking from the firehose, practicing the craft, building breakable toys, and reading (coding books, Descartes, and Beowulf).

3/26/2018BookBytes

3: Apprenticeship Patterns Ch 3-4

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

We talk about mapping out our careers (or lack thereof), what titles mean at companies, craft vs art, being the worst, and getting mentors.

3/12/2018BookBytes

2: Apprenticeship Patterns Ch 1-2

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

How do you set yourself up for success in your career as a software engineer? How do you learn? How do you go from junior to senior?

3/5/2018BookBytes

1: Apprenticeship Patterns Intro

Hosts: Adam Garrett-Harris, Jason Staten, and Megan Duclos

In this episode, we introduce the hosts, the podcast, and the first book we'll be reading, Apprenticeship Patterns.

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